Müzeyyen Senar

Müzeyyen Senar — Biography

Müzeyyen Senar (born Müzeyyen Dombayoğlu; 16 July 1918 in Gököz, Keles, Bursa – 8 February 2015 in İzmir) was a performer of Turkish art music and a film actress. Born in a village near Bursa in the closing years of the Ottoman Empire, she grew into one of the defining voices of the Republican period and was remembered throughout her life as the “Diva of the Republic”.

Her first musical education took place at the Anatolian Music Society, where she studied alongside the oud and violin master Kemal Niyazi Seyhun and the performer Hayriye Hanım. As word spread of this girl with the powerful, beautiful voice, leading composers of the era — Hafız Sadettin Kaynak, Selahattin Pınar, Lem'i Atlı and Mustafa Nafiz Irmak among them — also gave her lessons, teaching her their own compositions and encouraging her to sing them. Through her appearances on Istanbul Radio she made her name known to a wide audience, and in the summer of 1933 she was taken into the star programme of the celebrated Belvü nightclub, beginning to perform on the stages of Istanbul's nightclubs and music halls while still only in her teens. Her talent also drew the attention of Atatürk, the founder of the Republic and a great admirer of Turkish art music: between 1936 and 1938 she gave concerts before him on five occasions, the first of them at Dolmabahçe Palace in December 1936, and in 1938 she took part in the first broadcasts of Ankara Radio.

Across a stage and recording career stretching close to seventy years, she made countless recordings. The five-album series 40. Sanat Yılında Veda, issued in 1973 and 1974, celebrated the fortieth anniversary of her artistic journey. Albums such as Bir Bahar Akşamı (1977), Çilingir Sofrası (1978) and Müzeyyen Senar'la Fasl-ı Muhabbet (1989) reached a broad public, while repertoire collections like Atatürk'ün Sevdiği Şarkılar (2007) also appeared. Her final farewell to the stage came only in the 2000s.

Her ties with the cinema continued both as an actress and as a singer. Having begun her screen career with Kerem ile Aslı (1942) and Nasreddin Hoca Düğün'de (1943), she acted in films including İstanbul Geceleri (1950), Sihirli Define (1950), Ne Sihirdir Ne Keramet (1951), Sevgili Hocam (1972) and Analar Ölmez (1976), and her voice was heard in numerous Yeşilçam productions. She appeared in the television series Taş Plaktan Bugüne in 1989, and in 2005 Fatih Akın's documentary on Istanbul's musical life, İstanbul Hatırası: Köprüyü Geçmek, introduced her to younger generations.

Awarded the title of State Artist in 1998, she was also the recipient of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism's Grand Award for Culture and Art. She was married to Ercüment Işıl. She died on 8 February 2015 in İzmir, at the age of 96.