Ars & Cultural Outreach

I am the creator and host of a 13-episode musical travel documentary series for Turkish National Television's TRT Müzik channel. Drawing inspiration from the early twentieth-century expeditions of Turkish and foreign musicologists to collect folk songs from around Anatolia, in this program I travel around the country to meet culture-bearers of Türkiye's numerous diverse musical traditions. As the program's host, I interview the musical guests and also perform music in various regional styles alongside them on violin. Season 1 (airing Spring 2025) features musical traditions of Sufi dervish ceremonies, the Abdal community of Kırşehir, the Georgian-Turkish border, the Ottoman military band, the Hemşin community of Rize, and many more.

In partnership with the Centre for Cultural Sustainability (MIRAS) and in collaboration with experienced artist and arts educator Fırat Bingöl, I led workshops for elementary and high school students at two schools in Hatay (southeast Türkiye). As survivors of recent major earthquakes that decimated the region and claimed the lives of 55,000 people, many of these students live and attend school in shipping containers. With the goal of providing outlets for multidisciplinary creativity and helping process trauma, Fırat Bingöl and I put together workshops that incorporated movement, music, drawing, dance, and reflection. We received overwhelmingly positive feedback from the participants and their teachers and guardians, and l0ok forward to offering future iterations of the workshops in the region in the coming months.

I led an ensemble of thirty world musicians from diverse musical backgrounds, from Carnatic singing to Celtic fiddling. In weekly rehearsals, I worked to help the musicians (myself included) find a common musical language to perform works from far-reaching cultures. I organized public concerts and multiple family-oriented community workshops, which entailed managing venue booking and operations, social media, and the ensemble budget.

Watch the fall 2019 concert here. 

I helped to produce an interdisciplinary musical showcase of improvisatory and interactive events at London's Rich Mix as part of the city-wide Open Senses Festival. This involved managing booking forms, tech riders, scheduling, operations, and social media as well as assisting with grant-writing and liasing with the venue staff, artists, and audience.