Jazz Articles about Cigdem Aslan

Cigdem Aslan: Mortissa

by Chris M. Slawecki
January 18, 2014

Ҫiğdem Aslan was born in the cultural crossroads of Istanbul. She moved to London, hoping to advance her onstage and classroom studies in various musical cultures; these studies include her Songs of Smyrna project, which celebrates rebetiko and sephardic music from Turkey, and joining the She'Koyokh Klezmer Ensemble and the Balkan group Dunav. Mortissa is her solo debut, composed of rebetiko and smyrniac songs (often called “the blues of the Agean") from the 1920s and '30s. “Most of the songs ...