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Opera and Ballet |
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| Following the proclamation of the Republic, the efforts to spread polyphonic music in Turkey gained momentum and received the support of the State. Opera was regarded as the highest form of music and efforts were accelerated to establish a Turkish opera house. An “Opera Association” was established in Ýstanbul in 1930, and Verdi’s opera “La Traviata” was staged by the “Grand Opera Assembly” in 1934. The “Özsoy”, a composition by Ahmet Adnan Saygun which was performed successfully the same year in the presence of Atatürk and the Iranian Shah Rýza Pahlavi, is considered as a milestone in the history of Turkish opera. An orderly study of operas commenced upon the inauguration of the Ankara State Conservatory in 1936 and the establishment of the Conservatory Applied Theater Hall for senior students to stage their works. Famed composer Paul Hindermith and opera director Carl Ebert came from |
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“Swan Lake” Ballet / State Opera and Ballet |
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Germany to Turkey to teach and made notable contributions to the development of Turkish opera. The young students, who began to be trained in this period, were the pioneers of Turkish opera and gave their first performance at the Ankara Halkevi Theater in 1940. |
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| During this first performance, “Bastien and Bastienne” by Mozart and the second act of Puccini’s “Madame Butterfly” were successfully staged in Turkish. This was followed by the staging of the second act of Puccini’s “Tosca” and the full version of “Madame Butterfly” as well as Beethoven’s “Fidelio” in 1941. |
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| The earliest official and academic ballet school was first established in Ýstanbul in 1948 and moved to Ankara in 1950 to be attached to the State Conservatory. Dame Ninette de Valois, the founder of the British Royal Ballet who had been invited to Turkey in 1947 in order to prepare the set-up for the State ballet school, made an enormous contribution to the development of Turkish ballet. The first performance by the Ballet Department of the Ankara State Conservatory took place in 1950 when the “Pastoral Suite” and “Keloðlan” ballets choreographed by Joy Newton using the music composed by Ulvi Cemal Erkin were presented. |
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| This was followed by “El Amor Brujo”, the one-act ballet “Coppelia” and “Çeþmebaþý”, which was the first authentic ballet created by Dame de Valois merging Turkish folklore and ballet techniques and using the music composed by Ferit Tüzün. |
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The State Opera and Ballet, which had been functioning within the context of the 1949 State Theaters Establishment Law, was de facto detached from this body through the protocol drawn up by the Under-secretariat of Culture in 1968 and started functioning as a separate directorate general as of 1970. |
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