I am a composer, performer, improviser, and educator from Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA (more about me at my website). I am living in Istanbul for a few months to study Turkish music, specifically an instrument called the bağlama. I have performed a variety of music over the decades (including American vernacular styles and various ‘world’ musics), but have more recently been attracted to the music of the Middle East and Turkey. They have more notes to choose from than we do in the West, plus a highly developed rhythm system. This blog is a way for me to bring you all along on my adventures.

James Holdman

Istanbul

 A few technical notes:

The images seen on these pages are taken with the consumer-grade Canon Powershot A2500 digital camera (plus the occasional shot taken with a Moto-G cell phone). The audio is recorded on a Tascam DR07-MKII portable digital recorder. Editing is being done with open-source software: GIMP (images) and Audacity (audio).

Also, please note:

The webpage links that are provided in these postings do not indicate an implicit endorsement of those pages, but are provided for further information or, in some cases, amusement for the reader.

In addition:

The images posted to this website were all taken by me, and are copyrighted. Please ask permission to use them. You may link to them, however, in context of the website.

Please feel free to contact me.