EDUCATION
Conservatory of Music at Brooklyn College, City University of New York, USA.
Master of Music Degree, 2000
Major: Music Composition
Conservatory of Music at Brooklyn College, City University of New York, USA.
Bachelor of Music Degree, 1998
Major: Piano Performance
Hochschule fur Music und Darstellende Kunst in Graz, Austria.
Major: Chamber Music in Piano
Istanbul University State Conservatory, Istanbul, Turkey.
Major: Piano Performance
EXPERIENCE
2014-2016 Part-time instructure. Istanbul Sehir University. Faculty of Communication.
Course: Music and Sound Design in Film.
2011-2014 Part-time instructor. Faculty of Communication. İzmir University of Economics.
Course: Music and Sound Design in Film.
2009-201 Part-time instructor. Film and Television Department, Istanbul Bilgi University.
Graduate Course: Sound Practices for Screen.
Part-time instructor. Visual Communication Design Department, Istanbul Bilgi University.
Course: Sound for Visual Design.
2005- current Free Lance Composer
2001- 2005 Full-time instructor, Music Department, Istanbul Bilgi University.
Undergraduate Courses: ‘Electronic Music History’, ‘Electronic Music Style Analysis’, ‘20th Century Music’.
Graduate Courses: ‘New Directions in Music’, ‘Interpretation in Music’.
2003-2004 Department Head, Music Department, Istanbul Bilgi University.
COMPOSITIONS FOR MUSIC AND DANCE THEATER
Gümüş Ay
Music for full moon, haiku, poetry and dance.
Sabancı Museum. October 2017.
Punta Atmak
Mask Theater. October 2016
Sabancı Museum
Irk Bitig
Text-sound Theather
Director: Emre Koyuncuoğlu
Izmit Municipal Theater Production. April 2008.
16th International Istanbul Theater Festival. May 2008.
13th Ankara Internatioanl Theater Festival. November 2008.
Fiction as Reality
Dance Theater
Director: Emre Koyuncuoglu
‘0090KunstenFestival’ Antwerp. May 2004.
‘Dansem’, Marseille. October, 2007.
‘El Teatro’, Tunisia. March 2008.
Home Sweet Home
Music and Dance Theather
Director: Emre Koyuncuoğlu
‘Tanz im August’, Berlin, Germany. August 2004.
14th International Theater Festival in Istanbul’, May 2004.
‘Kunsten Festival des Arts’, Brussells. May 2004.
Diyarbakır, Çeltik Kilisesi, October 2003.
MUSIC FOR THEATER
Proust-Pamuk-Memory
Adaptation from Pamuk's Novel Museum of Innocence
Opole Theater, Poland. July 2014.
İçtima-i Hakiki
Adapted and directed by Emre Koyuncuoglu.
18th Istanbul Theater Festival. May 2012.
Hedda Gabler
Written by Henrik Ibsen.
Istanbul Municipal Theater. April 2012.
Nathan Schweigt
Theater Project after Gotthold Ephraim Lessing’s Play.
Theater Freiburg, Germany. May 2010
Black Comedy
Written by Peter Shaffer
Kocaeli Municipal Theater. Production. April 2011
The Glass Menagerie
Written by Tennesse Williams.
Eskişehir Municipal Theater Production. March 2009.
Pillow Man
Written by Martin McDonagh
Talimhane Theater Production, March 2009.
References to Salvador Dali Make Me Hot
Written by Jose Rivera.
Aksanat New Generation Theater. September 2008.
Blackbird
Written by David Harrower
Dot Theater Production. February 2008.
Farmyard
Written by Franz Xavier Kroetz
Aksanat. New Generation Theater. February 2007.
The Weir
Written by Conor McPherson
Kocaeli Municipal Theater Production. November 2006.
Far Away
Written by Caroll Churchill
Dot Theater Production. March 2006.
Ashes to Ashes, One for the Road
Written by Harold Pinter
Aksanat New Generation Theater Production. March 2006.
Crave and Psychosis 4.48
Writen by Sarah Kane
13th International Istanbul Theatre Festival. May 2002.
2nd International Theather Festival in Ankara. October 2003.
MUSIC FOR FILM
Istanbul Do/Redo/Undo: Waters, Streets, Faces
Director: Nezih Erdogan.
Istanbul 2010 Culture Capital Project.
Screenings: İstanbul Film Festival, 2010.
Making of the Wall
Director: Gülsün Karamustafa.
Cuba, Biennal, October 2003
WORKSHOPS
Workshop on film music.
18th Flying Broom International Women’s Film Festival. May 2015.
Improvisation techniques using text
Contemporary Art Center at Istanbul Municipal Theater, February 2012.
Improvisation tecniques using text
Collecting the Future Event.
Sinop, September 2011.
The use of text in contemporary music
Contemporary Art Center at Istanbul Municipal Theater, April 2011.
SOUND INSTALLATION
Margins of Istanbul
Port City Talks. Istanbul-Antwerp. Mas Museum, Antwerp. October 2015.
The city talks
After All. Simens Art Gallery. November 2013.
Sounds of Sinop
Collecting the Future.
Sinop, September 2011.
Beat
Sinopale, Sinop Biennial, August 2006.
Heimat
Artist: Hüseyin Alptekin
Under the Sign of the City exibition.
Kunst Museum, Bonn. December 2002.
PANELS
Phonem Elektronic Music Festival, Istanbul, March 2002.
Subject: ‘The future ways of listening to music’.
Participants:
David Toop (moderator),Vladislav Delay (Luomo), Çiğdem Borucu, Brnd Jestram (Tarwater), Ronald Lippok (Tarwater)
Diyarbakır Culture Center
Subject: ‘Sound and Visuals in Theater’, June 2003.
Participants: Emre Koyuncuoğlu, Aydın Sarıoğlu, Çiğdem Borucu
FESTIVAL AND PROGRAM COORDINATOR
New Music Days at Istanbul Bilgi University, April 2004.
Electronic Life Forms Festival, Academic Program Coordinator, Istanbul Bilgi University, May 2002.
Composers Concert Coordinator, Brooklyn College, CUNY.1995-2000.
SILENT FILM ACCOMPANIMENT
Forgetting the Archive. November 2018. TRT Radio. Harbiye, Istanbul
Ottoman Landscapes. Aksanat, Istanbul. December 2016.
Ottoman Landscapes. II. 22nd Gezici Festiva. Ankara, Kastamonu 2016.
Ottoman Landscapes. Pera Museum, Istanbul. December 2015.
Ottoman Landscapes. 20th Gezici Festival, Ankara. 2014
Cinematic Landscapes of the Ottoman World. Istanbul Silent Film days. Istanbul Modern
Museum. October 2014.
ACCOMPANIST
1995-1998 Piano Accompaniment for the Brooklyn College Chamber Chorus under Bruce McIntyre.
1996-1999 Piano Accompaniment for the Brooklyn College Percussion Ensemble under Morris Lang.
AWARDS
John Cage Award, June 2000, Brooklyn College.
Meriem Gideon Award, June 1998, Brooklyn College.
COMPOSITIONS
The following compositions for piano and I began to work on them when Nezih Erdoğan asked me to accompany silent films that were shot in the former Ottoman lands in the late 1890s. They were gathered from various film archives around the world. After the screeings I continued to develop these pieces apart from the films. But the feelings of the images stayed with me in shaping the melodic lines. The Lost Istanbul for example is not about a city that no longer exists, but it is about people I have seen in the images who no longer live.
Lost Istanbul-for piano.
Silver Moon- for piano.
Montenegro- for piano
Soldiers on train-for piano
Balkan Women-for piano
Streets of old Cairo-for piano
Migration-for piano
Vertical-for violin and prepared piano
Primary-for violin, cello and piano
Subordinate and flute improv- for tape. The instruments are cello, piano, flute and electronics
Tranquility-for kalimba and synthsizer
Istanbul Do/Redo/Undo-a tape composition for a documentary film. It uses field recordings of Istanbul, synthesizer, prepared piano and electronics.
Earth- a tape composision. It uses field recordings of Freiburg, spoken text and electronics.
Far away- for theater. A tape composition uses inside piano.
Scream! for theater. A tape composition uses inside piano.
So close-for theater. A tape composition uses inside piano, clarinet and electronics.
Margins of Istanbul-for an installation. It uses field recordings of Istanbul and synth.
Aegidium at the Parvis de Saint Gilles- a tape composition. It uses prepared piano.
Circle of Bb- for three saxophones, voice, prepared piano and live electronics. The piece is based on Bb and its overtones.
Mathnawi (Mesnevi)-for spoken voices, cello, ney and video, based on a poem by Jalalu'ddin Rumi from the book of Mathnawi. The poem is in Persian, and translated into Turkish and English. The video consists of Persian text and the modified images of the Whirling Dervishes.
Available on ‘Electroacoustic Music Ensemble of Brooklyn College’ CD (Year 2000).
Epicentre- for tape alone uses processed percussion instruments and oboe. It was created after a personal experience at the August 1999 earthquake of Istanbul.
Available on ‘Electroacoustic Music Ensemble of Brooklyn College’ CD (Year 2001).
Istanbul - a tape composition representing a 24-hour period
of Istanbul compressed into 8.5 minutes. The piece was created from field recordings of the city beginning at 5:30 AM with the morning call to prayer. This call is repeated five times, each time from a different part of the city.
Available on ‘Electroacoustic Music Ensemble of Brooklyn College’ CD (Year 1999).
Al-Datma-for two voices and prepared piano, based on a
tale of Princess Al-Datma and Prince Behram from the book of "The Thousand and One Nights".
Ink-Dark Moon -for three voices, cello, percussion and live electronics, based on a Japanese Haiku of the same name by Izumi Shikibu.
Silver Moon - for saxophone, prepared piano and live electronics. Each section has different live signal processing for each instrument. The three sections of this piece were based on a Japanese Haiku by Ryusui.
Available on ‘Electroacoustic Music Ensemble of Brooklyn College’ CD (Year 1997).
Performed at the Brooklyn College Electro-Acoustic Music
Festival in 1995 and at the Roulette in 1996.
From There to Here- a three movement piece for piano and
violin. It was influenced by Turkish rhythmic and folk music elements.
PERFORMANCES
1994-present
Concert performances:
* Performance of Ottoman and Turkish Folk muisc concert at Worldmusic Festival. Muddenahalli, India. October 2017.
* Performance called Gümüş Ay. Sabancı Museum. October 2017.
* Performance with choir of Istanbul Municipal Theater as a composer and director. Haldun Taner Hall. Istanbul. 2012.s
*Performance of Terry Winter Owens’s composition Ancient Breath of the Sea and Pulling Away from the Material World, New York City at the CUNY Graduate Center Oct. 28th, 2004.
*Performance with Brooklyn College Percussion Ensemble for the New Music Festival at Istanbul Bilgi Univesity, 5-8 April 2004, Istanbul
*‘Mesnevi’by Cigdem Borucu, International Electroacoustic Music Festival at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York, Ocbober 2003.
* ‘Mesnevi’ by Cigdem Borucu, International Electroacoustic Music Festival, Bogota,
Colombia, November 2001
* ‘Silver Moon’ by Cigdem Borucu, Roulette, New York, April 1996.
* ‘Mallarme’ by Boulez with the Brooklyn College Percussion Ensemble under Morris Lang
* ‘Amores’ by Cage with the Brooklyn College Percussion Ensemble under Morris Lang
*Solo piano recital, works by Beethoven, Mozart, Liszt, Schumann, Bartok
*Schubert Lieder with the Brooklyn College Opera
*‘Orchestral Suites’ by Stravinsky with the Conservatory Orchestra at Brooklyn
College under Harry Saltzman
*Brooklyn College Improvised Music Ensemble
*Several new works by student composers at Conservatory Composers Concert, Brooklyn College
*Ravel Chanson Madecasses at the Washington United Methodist Church, New York City
* ‘Music for Mallet Instruments’ by Steve Reich with the Brooklyn College
Percussion Ensemble under Morris Lang.
*Several chamber music concerts with small ensembles
by various composers at Brooklyn College
1983-1994
*Solo piano recitals in Frankfurt (1986), Istanbul (1985).
*Several chamber music concerts in Istanbul, Ankara, Budapest, Graz.