Hasan Yükselir

Hasan Yükselir — Biography

Hasan Yükselir was born in 1955 in the village of Ördekdede in Pazarcık, Kahramanmaraş, and spent his boyhood and teenage years in Gaziantep. He earned a bachelor's degree in music from Gazi University and later a master's degree in theatre from Ankara University, studying in its faculty covering languages, history and geography under composer Turgut Aldemir and soprano Sevim Çidamlı.

He joined the Ankara State Theatre in 1984, then relocated to Germany in 1993, working mainly out of Berlin from then on. Blending Anatolian folk songs with classical Western forms and jazz, he scored the films Umut Sokağı (1986) and Uzun İnce Bir Yol (1991), and became known for works such as the 1996 Concertino for Bağlama and Orchestra, premiered by the Cologne Symphony Orchestra, and the 2002 song cycle Sevda Ateşten Gömlek, drawing on poems by Nazım Hikmet. His son Fırat and daughter Dijle are also recognized musicians.