This book is a substantial and thorough musicological analysis of
Turkish folk music. It reproduces in facsimile Bartók's autograph record
of eighty seven vocal and instrumental peasant melodies of the Yürük
Tribes, a nomadic people in southern Anatolia. Bartók's introduction
includes his annotations of the melodies, texts, and translations and
establishes a connection between Old Hungarian and Old Turkish folk
music.
Begun in 1936 and completed in 1943, the work was Bartók's last major
essay. The editor, Dr. Benjamin Suchoff, has provided an historical
introduction and a chronology of the various manuscript versions. An
afterword by Kurt Reinhard describes recent research in Turkish
ethnomusicology and gives a contemporary assessment of Bartók's field
work in Turkey. Appendices prepared by the editor include an index of
themes compiled by computer.
Originally published in 1976.
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