Aykut Gürel Presents: “Selçuk Yöntem | Aşk İçin Önsöz”
iremrecords (2016)
Selçuk Yöntem (vo)
Aykut Gürel (b)
Siney Yılmaz (s)
Cem Tuncer (g)
Ercüment Orkut (p)
Ediz Hafızoğlu (d)
1. Şimdi Biliyorum
2. Senden Önce Ölmek İsterim / Pulling The Head Alone
3. Seni Saklayacağım / Audrey
4. An’lar / Bir Şans Daha
5. Kutla
6. 81
7. Bu Gece En Hüzünlü Şiiri Yazabilirim / Kimse Bilmez
8. Aşk İçin Önsöz / Teskin
9. Beni Güzel Hatırla / Rüya
10. Unutamıyorum / Giz
11. Evde Yoklar / Zaman
12. Gözlük / Yolculuk
13. Biraz Değiştim / Can
I do not remember whether I was in high school or in elementary school. I wrote things down, about my life, about all lives in general… Then they told me: “There is a poem reading competition, you should enter.” So I did. I read the poem and left the room without waiting to hear the results. Since they didn’t call me back to give me an award, I didn’t make it to the top three. It was a very different and exciting feeling. However, a few more years had to pass for me to understand the power and effect of poetry on the human soul.
I got ahold of a book with a white cover one day : “Orhan Veli-The Complete Poems”. It was a pleasant and gentle meeting. Poets from the “İkinci Yeni” (meaning “Second New”) movement followed: Edip, İlhan, Cemal, Turgut, Ece… Then I was surrounded by foreigners: Neruda, Plath, Blake, Wilde… I read them countless times and kept reading for years. But every book, every page, every photograph… I never heard them, I didn’t read them out loud, I didn’t get in front of the mirror and let myself go in the flow of the poem.
After that, I met Genco Erkal, who presents Nazim’s sharp lines on a golden platter, Müşfik Kenter who reintroduced Orhan Veli to us and Hakan Gerçek, who made us love Cemal Süreya. These best voices of the country were making the best lines written by Turkish poets immortal.
This list which heavily includes Turkish artists keeps going on and on and a new name was added to it in the past few months. Aykut Gürel, who has gained the admiration of many by planning his every project to the minutest of the details after shaping them for years in his head, works with Selçuk Yöntem for the next album instalment in his “Aykut Gürel Presents…” series.
Selçuk Yöntem (vo), Siney Yılmaz (s), Aykut Gürel (b), Ediz Hafızoğlu (d) (Photo: iremrecords)
What separates this album from the other albums focused on “poetry reading” is possibly the fact that Selçuk Yöntem, whose voice we have heard in many different projects in the years, is able to use his voice just as if it was an instrument. Yöntem takes music lovers to an earthly journey from Borges to Neruda, Özdemir Asaf to Nazım without missing the scales during chord changes, or instrument changes during the solos and immerses the listener in a perfect harmony. His performance capacity almost makes the Quintet, which consists of Cem Tuncer, Ediz Hafızoğlu, Ercüment Orkut, Aykut Gürel and Siney Yılmaz, into a sextet.
The fact that the recording was done live without any overdubbing, in contrast to “An American Prayer: Jim Morrison – Music by The Doors” album, shows that Selçuk Yöntem and Istanbul Ensemble value this project very highly and that they spent a lot of effort to put out something with high quality.
A note for those who have different expectations: This album doesn’t have “Aslan Bey” or “Adnan Bey”. There is no 500 thousand TL award for those who listen to the full album, either.
Selçuk Yöntem and Istanbul Ensemble start out this special journey with “Şimdi Biliyorum” and give a single but solid opportunity to those who want to see the sunset while sitting by the seashore, for those who want to reminisce about fifty years ago and tell those stories to their child, and for those who wish to feel the power of poetry in their essence.
