The Vienna Symphony Orchestra and Bruce Liu at the Atatürk Cultural Centre
The third concert of the 2026 İKSV Istanbul Music Festival that I attended took place at the Atatürk Cultural Centre on June 23. It is always a pleasure to listen to the foreign orchestras who come to...
View ArticleI Thought I Knew The Odyssey
I thought I knew The Odyssey. I was wrong. I discovered that in a neighborhood movie theatre in Istanbul. A few days after Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey premiered, I went to a Sunday morning...
View ArticleTake me to your lieder
The second concert of the 2026 İKSV Istanbul Music Festival that I attended took place at the Süreyya Opera House in Kadıköy on June 22. It featured the British tenor Ian Bostridge, the Turkish...
View ArticlePerfect Timing: The Jussen Brothers and Akademie Potsdam
The first concert of the 2026 İKSV Istanbul Music Festival that I attended took place in the Atatürk Cultural Centre’s Theatre Hall on June 15. I chose this particular event because it featured the...
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Take your seats for the virtuosi of tomorrow
At Enka Sanat's Gala Concert in İstinye on April 19, the seven musicians appear in order of age, starting with Aktan Odabaşı, a cellist from Ankara, seen below performing Haydn’s Cello Concerto No 1....
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London Antique Rug and Textile Art Fair 2026
A 17th-entury tapestry fragment at James Cohen Antique Carpets (LARTA 2026) Sadly, sadly, Sunday is the final day of the London Antique rug and Textile Art Fair, (open from 11am to 8pm till January...
View ArticleYoung Musicians Perform at ENKA
On April 19th I attended a concert in the auditorium of the ENKA compound on the hill leading down from Maslak towards İstinye. The event, a Gala Concert, featured performances by seven young...
View ArticleThe Bosphorus Trio at Notre Dame de Sion
On Thursday, April 2 I attended a concert at the Notre Dame de Sion French Lycée in Harbiye, Istanbul that featured the ‘Bosphorus Trio’. Founded in 2016, this ensemble consists of violinist Özgecan...
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Mardin Biennial 2026
From its ridge high above the Mesopotamian plain, the city of Mardin in southeastern Turkey appears suspended between Earth and sky, its honey-hued buildings mixing with bands of heat and light. This...
View ArticleThe Friday 13th Jinx Strikes Nielsen, But Not Chopin
On March 13 I attended a concert at the Atatürk Cultural Centre that had been organised to celebrate Women’s Day (March 8th). The previous concert I had witnessed at this venue had taken place on...
View ArticleTheodore Mould – In Search of Phillipo
Philip John Nigohrus, known as Phillipo, was an Armenian merchant from the Ottoman Empire whose contributions to Anglo-Ottoman exchange in the eighteenth century have only recently been rediscovered....
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First, grandeur – then gloom, doom and broomsticks
On Friday, February 13 I braved the inauspiciousness of the date to attend a concert at the Atatürk Cultural Centre. This event, one of the DenizBank concerts, brought together two musicians from...
View ArticleGloom, doom and broomsticks
On Friday 13th February I braved the inauspiciousness of the date to attend a concert at the Atatürk Cultural Centre. This event, one of the DenizBank concerts, brought together two musicians from...
View ArticleA walk on the mild side
The concert at the Atatürk Cultural Centre on January 16 featured a British viola-player performing a work by a British composer, so I naturally felt obliged to attend it. The Suite for Viola and...
View ArticleA dose of string fever
On December 5 I returned to the Atatürk Cultural Centre to attend another concert by the Istanbul State Symphony Orchestra. This event, one of the DenizBank concerts, featured Italian guest conductor...
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Rooted: The Garden Within
Işık Güner, Iris gatesii Foster (2025) Yunus Karma’s Kintsugi Moss Sculpture (2025) poised in the Şule Gazioğlu Gallery As Istanbul edges towards spring, a new exhibition at the Şule Gazioğlu Gallery...
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London Antique Rug and Textile Art Fair 2026
A 17th-entury tapestry fragment at James Cohen Antique Carpets (LARTA 2026) Sadly, sadly, Sunday is the final day of the London Antique rug and Textile Art Fair, (open from 11am to 8pm till January...
View ArticleRising to the occasion
On November 28 I attended a concert at the Atatürk Cultural Centre in which the Istanbul State Symphony Orchestra was conducted by Sascha Goetzel (photograph by Özge Balkan). This event, one of the...
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Steetwise
In its latest issue, Cornucopia published a highly personal portrait of Beyoğlu, the defiantly bohemian district of European Istanbul, with a moving tribute to its spirited history by Maureen Freely....
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