Sufi aesthetics in the Mevlevi tradition and Mataram Court art illuminate a deep interconnection between spiritual consciousness and artistic expression, underscoring how mystical ideas are transformed into aesthetic experiences through sound, movement, and symbolism. The Mevlevi order, inspired by Jalal al-Din Rumi’s Mathnawi, embodies a synthesis of poetry, music, and ritual performance to attain divine unity through the harmony of form and spirit. Meanwhile, the Mataram Court, during the reign of Sultan Agung (1613–1645), developed a comparable aesthetic philosophy in which musical compositions (gendhing), literary forms, and performative arts, such as wayang, were interwoven with mystical and cosmological meanings. Although previous research has examined Rumi’s Mathnawi and Javanese Gendhing literature independently, few studies have explored the interplay between their respective aesthetic traditions. This study explores possible aesthetic correspondences between Mevlevi practices in Anatolia and the artistic system of the Mataram Court, emphasizing how Sufi principles particularly the notions of tawhid (unity) and fana’ (self-annihilation) were reinterpreted within Javanese palace cosmology. The research employs an art historical and comparative analytical method, combining textual interpretation of Mathnawi and Gendhing literature with musical analysis of gamelan rebab practices and symbolic readings of wayang performances, particularly Gendhing Sunyaruri. Primary and secondary data were obtained through comprehensive literature review and hermeneutic analysis of sources on Sufism, Islamic aesthetics, and seventeenth-century Javanese culture. The findings do not suggest a direct historical transmission from the Mevlevi order in Anatolia to the Mataram Court. Rather, they demonstrate how comparable Sufi aesthetic values including tawhid, fana’, quietness, love, and spiritual pedagogy were articulated and creatively localized within two distinct historical and cultural traditions. In the Mataram context, art functioned simultaneously as a pedagogical tool, a symbolic language of divine order, and a medium of royal legitimation, merging Islamic mysticism with indigenous metaphysical systems. By revealing these interwoven layers of meaning, the study contributes to broader discourses on Islamic and comparative aesthetics, positioning the Mataram Court as a vital locus of cross-cultural synthesis and a significant contributor to the spiritual and artistic identity of the Indonesian archipelago.
Throughout history, from antiquity to the present, music philosophy and theory have transcended being merely an auditory aesthetic discipline or a regulative performance guide. Instead, they functioned as a metaphysical “theoria” model that conceptualizes the ontological structure of the universe, its cosmological functioning, and humanity’s existential position. This study holds significant importance within the interdisciplinary music philosophy literature by deciphering the paleo-epistemological layers of the “Zühre Prayer” (Zühre Duası) ritual. This ritual is described in Edvâr-ı Mûsikî, a foundational text of Ottoman music theory, written by Ahmedoğlu Şükrullah in the 15th century. The primary objective and central problem of this research is to provide an in-depth examination, through semiotic, and philosophical perspectives, of how esoteric codes from Ancient Mesopotamian mythology, Neoplatonism, and Illuminationist Philosophy (İşrâk)—hidden within the prayer text and its surrounding occult rituals—were syncretized in the Ottoman episteme. The study utilizes an original “Hybrid Semiotic Model” that synthesizes philosophical hermeneutics and structural/ philosophical semiotics, alongside archaeo-musicological data, and employs a “Relational History Research” design. During the analysis process, the text was correlated with Boethius’s ancient hierarchy of music (Musica Instrumentalis, Musica Humana, Musica Mundana) and examined across the layers of denotation, connotation, and myth. The historical journey of terms such as “The Primordial Beloved” (Kadim Maşuk), “Universal Intellect” (Külli Akıl), “Third Celestial Sphere” (Üçüncü Felek), and “Zühre” was resolved, tracing their path from the Sumerian Inanna/Enki cult to Suhrawardi’s hierarchy of lights. The findings demonstrate that the Zühre Prayer is not an ordinary religious supplication. Rather, it is a Theurgic act (teürjik eylem) that aims to bridge the macrocosm and microcosm to bring celestial frequencies down to earth. Furthermore, data within the prayer prove that the Sumerian Inanna cult survived by merging with the Neoplatonic Emanation (sudûr) theory in an astronomical form. Consequently, this study reveals that Ottoman music theory is not merely a normative discipline consisting of mathematical calculations. Instead, it embodies a profound hermetic synthesis filtered through Islamic mysticism (tasavvuf) and Illuminationist Philosophy (İşrâk). Within this cosmology, the musician (mousikos) is a cosmic Theurgist who initiates the return (Rücu) of the soul from its bodily cage to its origin.
The lyrics of folk songs in the Turkish Folk Music repertoire constitute an important body of cultural data for examining how women’s identities are represented through social roles, cultural values, and gender discourses. This study aims to reveal the social roles, thematic structures, and discursive practices through which women’s identities are represented in the lyrics of folk songs included in the TRT Turkish Folk Music repertoire. The study was designed within a qualitative research framework and employed a two-stage analytical model. In the first stage, 500 folk songs randomly selected from the TRT repertoire were examined using Braun and Clarke’s (2006) thematic analysis model. In the second stage, the themes identified were interpreted at the levels of text, discursive practice, and social practice in accordance with Fairclough’s (1995) Critical Discourse Analysis approach. Intercoder agreement was calculated at 86%. The findings indicate that women’s identities are predominantly represented through the roles of beloved/lover (yar) (58%), bride (16%), wife (11%), daughter (7%), and mother (6%). Forms of social, familial, and male-dominated pressure directed toward women were identified in 23.8% of the folk songs, while body-centered representations and discourses of objectification were found in 18.2%. Within a repertoire dominated by male narrators, songs voiced from a woman’s perspective accounted for only 7.6%, while positive or idealized representations of women remained at a relatively low level of 4.4%. Nevertheless, some female-voiced narratives contained discursive markers indicative of female agency and resistance. The critical discourse analysis further demonstrates that women are predominantly defined in relation to male narrators’ desires and expectations and within socially prescribed roles, while women’s identities are discursively reproduced through relational roles, bodily discourses, and family-centered identities. By contrast, the relatively limited number of female-voiced folk songs create alternative discursive spaces that render visible women’s experiences of oppression, violence, forced marriage, separation from home (gurbet), and longing. The study therefore suggests that folk songs should be understood not merely as aesthetic and folkloric products, but also as cultural texts that may contribute to the discursive reproduction of patriarchal gender norms, constructions of womanhood, and cultural memory. The study makes an original contribution to the literature by systematically examining the TRT repertoire on a national scale, integrating thematic analysis with critical discourse analysis, and evaluating representations of women within the frameworks of feminist musicology and gender theories.
The adoption of Janissary music and instruments into European military bands represents one of the earliest examples of direct musical exchange between the Ottoman Empire and Europe. While previous scholarship has primarily examined the appearance of Turkish elements as markers of exoticism, less attention has been given to their long-term functional transformation within the Western musical tradition. This article investigates how, and through which historical, political, and musical processes Janissary music evolved from an Ottoman military practice into an integral component of the Western orchestral repertoire. More specifically, it asks how Janissary music gradually transcended its original military and representational functions to become an autonomous component of the Western orchestral language no longer associated with the Ottoman Empire or the East. Adopting a historical musicology approach, the study combines archival research with the analysis of historical documents, diplomatic and military records, contemporary accounts, opera libretti, and comparative musical analysis to trace the evolution of the function of Janissary music in Europe. Chronologically, the article spans the period from the establishment of the Ottoman mehter tradition in the fourteenth century, to the early nineteenth century, when the Janissary style became firmly integrated into the Western orchestral tradition. The evidence demonstrates that the Janissary style underwent a gradual transformation in function. Initially adopted into European military bands through military conflicts, diplomacy, and cultural exchange, it subsequently entered the French theatrical repertoire, where it primarily functioned as markers of Ottoman exoticism through theatrical conventions rather than orchestral practice. In the Viennese repertoire, however, Janissary elements became increasingly integrated into the musical score itself, laying the foundation for their gradual detachment from direct Ottoman representation. During the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, composers increasingly employed alla turca elements in symphonies, concertos, patriotic, and ceremonial works, expanding the function of the style beyond Ottoman representation and serving distinctly European rather than Ottoman contexts. The function of the Janissary style continued to evolve in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, where it acquired a broader humanistic role within the Western orchestral tradition. Rather than remaining a musical device for representing the Ottoman Empire or the East, Janissary music gradually acquired military, ceremonial, political, and ultimately humanistic functions within European orchestral practice. Elements once considered “alien” gradually became detached from Turkish subjects and eventually “came to stay” as a natural component of the Western orchestral palette, no longer associated exclusively with the Ottomans or the East.
The article presents a text-oriented analysis of modern Kazakh music for prepared piano in the context of musical semiotics, hermeneutics, and intertextuality. The study aimed to identify the features of the formation of the artistic text in the works of Daniyar Berzhaprakov Umai and the triptych of Roman Vlasov Shapqyn, Zhoqtau, Toi Bastar (Dala Dāýsy – “Voice of the Steppe”). The methodology combined semiotic, hermeneutic, intertextual, and analytical-interpretative approaches. As a result, it was established that the modern Kazakh school of prepared piano has formed a new model of musical thinking, in which timbre, gesture, silence, and bodily interaction with the instrument have become full-fledged carriers of meaning. In the work Umai, timbre modifications were associated with the mythological image of the goddess Umai and created a multi-level system of symbols. In the cycle Dala Dāýsy, a prepared piano was used to represent cultural memory and the ritual cycle of life, in which each part symbolized a distinct existential state: movement, grief, and rebirth. A comparison with the work of John Cage showed that Kazakh composers reinterpreted the avant-garde tradition by emphasizing the semantic richness of sound. It was concluded that the prepared piano in modern Kazakh music became not only an experimental technique. It was a complex semiotic system that combined national archetypes, the physicality of performance, and avant-garde aesthetics. The results obtained expanded the understanding of the development of non-European practices of prepared piano and demonstrated the specifics of the integration of local cultural codes into modern musical language.
