Gürer Aykal (born May 22, 1942) is a Turkish conductor and adjunct professor at

Bilkent University Bilkent University ( tr, Bilkent Üniversitesi) is a private university located in Ankara, Turkey. It was founded by Prof. İhsan Doğramacı in 1984, with the aim of creating a center of excellence in higher education and research. It is constan ...

. He has been the musical director and principal conductor of the

Borusan Istanbul Philharmonic Orchestra The Borusan Istanbul Philharmonic Orchestra ( tr, Borusan İstanbul Filarmoni Orkestrası), also known as the BIPO, is a Turkish orchestra based in Istanbul that was formed by enlarging the Borusan Chamber Orchestra in 1999. It is funded by the ...

since 1999.

Education

Aykal was born in

Eskişehir Eskişehir ( , ; from "old" and "city") is a city in northwestern Turkey and the capital of the Eskişehir Province. The urban population of the city is 898,369 with a metropolitan population of 797,708. The city is located on the banks of the ...

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula ...

. He studied at the

Ankara State Conservatory The Hacettepe University Ankara State Conservatory ( tr, Hacettepe Üniversitesi Ankara Devlet Konservatuvarı), the first conservatory to be founded in the Republic of Turkey, was established in 1936 by a directive of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. Th ...

, completing a course on

violin The violin, sometimes known as a '' fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone ( string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument ( soprano) in the family in regu ...

in 1963 (under Necdet Remzi Atak) and another on composition in 1969 (under Ahmed Adnan Saygun). He went on to study conducting in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

at the

Guildhall School of Music The Guildhall School of Music and Drama is a conservatoire and drama school located in the City of London, United Kingdom. Established in 1880, the school offers undergraduate and postgraduate training in all aspects of classical music and ja ...

, where he was taught by such conductors as

André Previn André George Previn (; born Andreas Ludwig Priwin; April 6, 1929 – February 28, 2019) was a German-American pianist, composer, and conductor. His career had three major genres: Hollywood films, jazz, and classical music. In each he achieved ...

and George Hurst. He then went to

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

for further study, graduating with a D.M.A. in conducting from Santa Cecilia Academy of Music in 1973. Finally, on

Adnan Saygun Ahmet Adnan Saygun (; 7 September 1907 – 6 January 1991) was a Turkish composer, musicologist and writer on music. One of a group of composers known as the Turkish Five who pioneered western classical music in Turkey, his works show a mast ...

's request, he stayed in Italy to study

Gregorian chant Gregorian chant is the central tradition of Western plainchant, a form of monophonic, unaccompanied sacred song in Latin (and occasionally Greek) of the Roman Catholic Church. Gregorian chant developed mainly in western and central Europe dur ...

and

polyphonic Polyphony ( ) is a type of musical texture consisting of two or more simultaneous lines of independent melody, as opposed to a musical texture with just one voice, monophony, or a texture with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords, ...

Renaissance music Renaissance music is traditionally understood to cover European music of the 15th and 16th centuries, later than the Renaissance era as it is understood in other disciplines. Rather than starting from the early 14th-century '' ars nova'', the T ...

at the Pontificio Istituto di Musica Sacra.

Career

Aykal has conducted the Istanbul State Symphony Orchestra, the

English Chamber Orchestra The English Chamber Orchestra (ECO) is a British chamber orchestra based in London. The full orchestra regularly plays concerts at Cadogan Hall, and their ensemble performs at Wigmore Hall. The orchestra regularly tours in the UK and internationall ...

, the

London Philharmonic Orchestra The London Philharmonic Orchestra (LPO) is one of five permanent symphony orchestras based in London. It was founded by the conductors Sir Thomas Beecham and Malcolm Sargent in 1932 as a rival to the existing London Symphony and BBC Symp ...

, the Sinfonieorchester des Norddeutschen Rundfunks Hamburg, the Ankara Chamber Orchestra (which he founded with

Suna Kan Suna may refer to: People * Suuna I of Buganda, king of Buganda until 1609 *Suna II of Buganda, king of Buganda from 1836 until 1856 * Suna Kan (born 1936), Turkish violinist of classical music *Suna Kıraç (1941–2020), member of the Turkish Ko ...

), and the Concertgebouw Chamber Orchestra. In 1975 he became the principal conductor of the

Presidential Symphony Orchestra The Presidential Symphony Orchestra ( tr, Cumhurbaşkanlığı Senfoni Orkestrası), with headquarters in Ankara, is the presidential symphony orchestra of the Republic of Turkey. Its history dates back as far as 1826, making it one of the first s ...

Ankara Ankara ( , ; ), historically known as Ancyra and Angora, is the capital of Turkey. Located in the central part of Anatolia, the city has a population of 5.1 million in its urban center and over 5.7 million in Ankara Province, maki ...

. From 1987 to 1991, Aykal was the music director of the Lubbock Symphony Orchestra in

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2020, it is the second-largest U.S. state by ...

, and subsequently from 1992 to 2004 he served as the music director of the

El Paso Symphony Orchestra EL, El or el may refer to: Religion * El (deity), a Semitic word for "God" People * EL (rapper) (born 1983), stage name of Elorm Adablah, a Ghanaian rapper and sound engineer * El DeBarge, music artist * El Franco Lee (1949–2016), American ...

, also in Texas. Among Aykal's other appointments since returning to Turkey, he was named Artistic Director of the Antalya International Piano Festival in the summer of 2014.

Awards

The Turkish government awarded him the honorary title of State Artist in 1981 for his services to music.

References

Sources and external links

*Harriet Smith, "Turkish Delight" (''

BBC Music Magazine ''BBC Music Magazine'' is a British monthly magazine that focuses primarily on classical music. History The first issue appeared in September 1992. BBC Worldwide, the commercial subsidiary of the BBC was the original owner and publisher togeth ...

'' 12:11, July 2004: pp 28–31)
"Gürer Aykal"
— Leyla Gencer Voice Competition page

— Bilkent University 1942 births Living people Turkish conductors (music) Texas classical music State Artists of Turkey Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia alumni Bilkent University faculty Ankara State Conservatory alumni People from Eskişehir 21st-century conductors (music) {{Turkey-musician-stub