The role of kudum in the history of Turkish music and in Turkey current executive status review

The kudüm is widely used in Turkey today in the performance of the Mevlevi Liturgy form, which is known as the major form of the tekke (religious) music branch of urban classical Turkish makam (mode) music and religious music. According to the instrument classification, the kudüm is a member of the kettledrum family, which is one of the subcategories of the class of leather coated percussion instruments (membranophone). When the history of Turkish culture is examined, it can be traced from the Dede Korkut stories, which are Turkish texts that coincide with the Abbasid period (750-1258), as the earliest example to today's Turkey. The kudüm instrument that are known to have common structural characteristics are found in close and distant geographies such as India, Iran, Azerbaijan and Arab countries. The discussion in this study is containing to determine the current performing styles of the kudüm in the context of the views and approaches of kudüm performers who work in religious and non-religious classical Turkish makam music ensembles, which are related to General Directorate of Fine Arts affiliated to the Ministry of Culture and Tourism of the Republic of Turkey and TRT. Interviews were conducted with six performers/artists working as state artists in these institutions, by asking 26 semi-structured questions to understand the current performance practices of the kudüm. In addition, a lot of information has been revealed through literature review and compilation within the scope of the descriptive method as a pillar of the qualitative method by examining the transformation and change that the kudüm instrument has undergone throughout Turkish civilizations from the past to the present. In the light of the findings obtained through the interviews, it has emerged among the main results of the research that the traditional playing style of the kudum has not changed and that it is the instrument of today's Mevlevi rites in the conducting position.