The history of “SAZ”

Petra Nachtmanova – who fell in love with the haunting sound of the Saz in the Turkish-populated suburbs of Berlin – has traced its journey from Central Asia to the Balkans in a documentary film.

The musical instrument called the Saz has known many names and incarnations. Transforming and evolving over thousands of years, it has migrated from Central Asia to the Balkans under different names and shapes and with different tunes – as the Baglama in Anatolia, the Kopuz in Central Anatolia, the Dotar in Iran and the Saz, or Cifte Telli, in the Balkans.

While it has Indian, Iranian and Kurdish elements and roots, it is most attached to the musical culture that the Oguz Turks, Seljuks and Ottomans brought to Anatolia from Central Asia and then to the Balkans, after the Ottoman armies conquered the former lands of the Byzantine Empire and the medieval Balkan states.

Musician Petra Nachtmanova, born in Vienna to a Polish mother and a Czech father, and raised in Berlin, fell in love with the mystical melodies of the Saz and the stories and philosophy behind it.

“I knew nothing about Saz until I was 20. I discovered it at a Cem House [Turkish Alevite house of worship] in Berlin. Later, I learnt the culture and the language. Since then, Saz never let me go and I have been stuck to it,” Nachtmanova tells BIRN.

Nachtmanova may have met relatively late with Saz in the Berlin suburbs populated by many Turks and Kurds from Turkey, but in a short time has become popular for her enthusiasm for Turkish bardic culture and Saz – and of course for her crystalline voice.

“When I started to play Saz on YouTube it created some kind of interest because I believe I looked very un-Turkish,” she says, alluding to her blonde hair.

Journey made in reverse direction

Petra Nachtmanova plays Saz on a horse. Photo: Sazfilm.com

Nachtmanova’s popularity reached another peak after she released a documentary film produced by Stephan Talneau, Saz: The key of Trust, this year.

In the documentary, she and her team travel from Berlin to Iran through Bosnia, Albania, Kosovo, Bulgaria, Turkey and Azerbaijan in order to follow the Saz’s journey – from the opposite direction.

“We discussed making it a piece of academic research about Turkish bardic culture in Berlin but then our director said, ‘Let’s make a [documentary] film.’ We did not want to go to Anatolia directly from Berlin but decided to follow a line from the Balkans to Anatolia and Iran,” Nachtmanova recalls.

She understood that over time that there were two main lines in Saz’s westward journey.

“The first was from Central Asia to the Balkans through Anatolia but another ran from India to Kurdish areas in Mesopotamia through Iran. These two main lines are also related to each other,” she says.

She adds that the name of the instrument used in a country offers a clue to where the instrument originates from.

“For instance, the Bulgarian Tambura, related to the Indian Tambura or Bosnian Saz, is also related to the Anatolian Saz. The Albanian cifte telli, meaning ‘two strings’, obviously comes from the Turkish language but Iran’s Dotar has also the same meaning,” she explains.

Nachtmanova says that, in the end, all these names refer to one instrument, the Saz.

“This is one instrument but everyone puts in something from themselves, and then the number of strings, shapes and tunes has also changed accordingly,” she says.

For Nachtmanova, the stories and philosophy told via songs and Saz in many cultures and nations are as important as the instrument itself.

People sang and played Saz to tell stories about war, love, rebellions, religion and history, she says.

“This instrument teaches people humility. I accept that It is not possible to understand everything about it, but I feel love and patience [with Saz],” Nachtmanova says in the documentary when they visit Tunceli, a city in Turkey with a strong Saz culture.

Nachtmanova and her colleagues are planning to hold a music festival which will comprise many of the musicians they met on their journey.

Musical link with Ottoman Empire

Nachtmanova’s journey in the film starts in Zivinice in Bosnia, researching the roots of Bosnia’s large and fancy-looking Saz.

“Zivinice was our first shoot and we stayed there almost a week. Bosnia’s Saz is a connection between the Ottoman Empire and Bosnia. It is a huge instrument. My arm can hardly reach the end of it,” Nachtmanova says.

In Bosnia, she also visits an old Saz atelier owned by a local Bosniak and later, wearing a traditional Bosnian dress and fez, performs with a local Sevdah music band.

“Originally, it was from Persia and then the Turks brought it here [Bosnia] and we upgraded it fit our music,” Elmir Krivalic, a member of the Sazlija Sevdah Zivinice band, says in the film.

While the Bosnian Saz is huge, complex and fancy, the Albanian Cifte Telli is the opposite. It is small, has only one colour and has only two strings, similar to the Iranian Dotar or the Central Asian Kopuz.

“Saz transformed a lot in the region. The Bosnian Saz is huge but the Albanian cifte telli is very small. I sometimes question if they are the same instrument. Saz is a very urban elite instrument in Bosnia but in Albania it is other way around,” Nachtmanova notes.

After she sang Albanian songs about their rebellions against Ottoman Sultans, played and danced in the Albanian mountains, she continued her journey to Bulgaria where Saz culture is almost forgotten.

BULGARİA

They almost leave Bulgaria empty handed until they find a local ethnic Turk in eastern Bulgaria who had saved a centuries-old Saz and lyrics written in an old notebook, passed from generation to generation.

The remote village’s locals says in the film that their ancestors came from Khorasan, an ancient Turkic region that today lies in Iran, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. Marks on the ancient Saz in Persian offer proof of their story.

Before leaving for Turkey, Azerbaijan and Iran, Nachtmanova was impressed with their tale, and promised to take it to Khorasan, their ancient fatherland.

“Mountain cannot meet with mountain but people can meet people,” an old local concurs, using an ancient Turkish saying, referencing situations of despair but also hope.

Nachtmanova explains in the film that European culture shaped today’s Saz in the Balkans, noting similarities with the European Mandolin and Greek Bouzuki.

“This is one instrument – but everyone put something in it from themselves and then the number of strings, shapes and tunes were changed accordingly,” she concludes.

Source: BalkanInsight