Kardes Türküler

Kardes Türküler is a renowned music project with a varying line-up that plays traditional songs in all the original spoken languages of Turkey. The band was founded in 1993 by a group of students in the Folklore Club of the Bogaziçi University in Istanbul with the goal of fraternizing and celebrating all the different ethnic cultures and different believes in Anatolia, Mesopotamia and Balkans. Their repertoire consists of songs in Turkish, Armenian, Kurdish, Circussian, Arabic, Macedonian, Roma and many more languages. The band performed at numerous world music festivals in Europe, including Amsterdam Roots, Stimmen in the German city of Lörrach and surrounding towns, the Oslo World Music Festival and Istanbul Ekspres in Gent, Holland Festival in Amsterdam. Very often, the band works with guest musicians, including Armenian avant-garde folk musician Arto Tungboyaciyan, American Armenian oud player Ara Dinkjian, British Palestinian jazz singer Reem Kelani and pop singer Sezen Aksu or Candan Ercetin from Turkey. The band made music for several movies, including Vizontele by director Yilmaz Erdogan, one of the most successful Turkish movies ever made, and Kingdom of Heaven by the director Ridley Scott. Kardes Türküler was awarded with the prize for best film score at the Antalya Altin Portakal Film Festival, the most important film festival in Turkey.