Abstract

Only four of the twelve homophonies, which have become a tuning system based on the ney measures in the Turkish music performance tradition, can be performed without making any changes in the tuning of the three-stringed classical kemençe. The use of these homophonies, which are named Bolahenk, Sipürde, Kız and Mansur, is only possible due to the limitations reflected in the performance technique of the instrument's sound spectrum of approximately two and a half octaves. The use of homophonies, which are difficult to perform with the classical kemençe, is not preferred due to the insufficient chord and sound spectrum. These homophonies create similar difficulties in the performance technique of other Turkish music string instruments. For this reason, as a solution, for some homophonies, the chords of the instruments are changed and the methods in which the performance technique can be more comfortable are employed. Similarly, the changes and propositions that can be made in tuning so that the homophonies, which are difficult to perform in classical kemençe, can be performed more easily, have formed the purpose of this study. Since the playing position of the instrument in the aforementioned homophonies differs depending on the identifying frets of the tunes, this study is limited, among the most played tunes, to those tunes deciding on the rast and dugâh frets. By determining which homophonies are performed easily or with difficulty in the tune scales included in the scope of this study, a solution was sought through two types of new tuning suggestions for those which are hard to perform, in which six homophonies that can be easily performed were identified via the proposed new tunings, with all the strings lowered equally at half-tone while only the thickest string lowered one or one and a half tone.

Keywords