TPAO Batman was a Turkish

popular music Popular music is music with wide appeal that is typically distributed to large audiences through the music industry. These forms and styles can be enjoyed and performed by people with little or no musical training.Popular Music. (2015). ''Fun ...

band that was active between 1963 and 2000.

Background

TPAO is the abbreviation of

Türkiye Petrolleri Anonim Ortaklığı TPAO or Turkish Petroleum Corporation has been established in order to perform hydrocarbon exploration, drilling, production, refinery and marketing activities on behalf of the Turkish Republic with the law 6327 in 1954. Many milestones in Turki ...

, the national petroleum company of

Turkey Turkey, officially the Republic of Türkiye, is a country mainly located in Anatolia in West Asia, with a relatively small part called East Thrace in Southeast Europe. It borders the Black Sea to the north; Georgia (country), Georgia, Armen ...

and

Batman Batman is a superhero who appears in American comic books published by DC Comics. Batman was created by the artist Bob Kane and writer Bill Finger, and debuted in Detective Comics 27, the 27th issue of the comic book ''Detective Comics'' on M ...

is a recently developed city close to Turkey's only oilfield. The refinery of Batman was set up in 1955 In the 1950s, the population of Batman was only a few thousand, and most of the workers dwelled in the refinery site. The refinery administration provided social amenities including a dance ensemble.

Band and musicians

The band TPAO Batman was founded in 1963 by Ahmet Akman.Milliyet newspaper
/ref> Initially, the ensemble was playing

dance music Dance music is music composed specifically to facilitate or accompany dancing. It can be either a whole piece or part of a larger musical arrangement. In terms of performance, the major categories are live dance music and recorded dance musi ...

and

jazz Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana, in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Its roots are in blues, ragtime, European harmony, African rhythmic rituals, spirituals, h ...

. But they soon became familiar with the folk music of the area around the refinery, called Türkü, and they included arranged folk songs to their repertoire. Although Ahmet Akman left the group, they continued up to 2000. The band consisted of İlhan Telli (keyboard and vocals),

Semih Özmert Hasan Semih Özmert (27 July 1921 in Üsküdar, Istanbul – 3 November 2015) was a Turkish judge who served as the president of the Constitutional Court of Turkey The Constitutional Court of Turkey ( Turkish: ''Anayasa Mahkemesi'', sometimes abb ...

(drums), Çetin Oral (

bass guitar The bass guitar (), also known as the electric bass guitar, electric bass, or simply the bass, is the lowest-pitched member of the guitar family. It is similar in appearance and construction to an Electric guitar, electric but with a longer nec ...

), Ünal Yiğitbaş (saxophone) and Atilla Akman (solo guitar).

Golden Microphone award

Between 1965 and 1968, newspaper ''

Hürriyet ''Hürriyet'' (, ''Liberty'') is a major List of newspapers in Turkey, Turkish newspaper, founded in 1948. it had the highest circulation of any newspaper in Turkey at around 319,000. ''Hürriyet'' combines entertainment with news coverage and ...

'' organized annual music contests, and TPAO Batman participated in 1966, 1967 and 1968. In these contests, the participants were required to play either new creations or arranged folkloric melodies. The TPAO Batman entries were as follows :Anadolu pop page
/ref> {, class="sortable wikitable" !Year !Name of the song !Rank , - , 1966, , ''Kaleden Top Atarlar'', , (Qualified for the finals) , - , 1976, , ''Karatoprak'', , (Qualified for the finals) , - , 1968, , ''Meşelidir Enginde Dağlar'', , {{gold1 Prize With these melodies, the band, hitherto quite unknown outside the TPAO circles, made a name. In addition to the melodies listed above, ''Fırat Kenarında Yüzen Kayıklar'' (“The rowboats sailing in Euphrates”), a melody on the reverse side of 1966 entry record, earned them a nationwide reputation.

References

1963 establishments in Turkey Turkish pop music groups 2000 disestablishments in Turkey Batman, Turkey Musical groups established in 1963 Musical groups disestablished in 2000