Levantine Rhapsody: Sound Worlds in Dialogue

Levantine Rhapsody, presented by Music Before 1800 in collaboration with the World Music Institute on Sunday, May 31 at Corpus Christi Church, will be a program shaped by exchange, memory, and the persistent movement of sound across borders. Centered on the artistry of Turkish kanun virtuoso Didem Basar, this concert traces a musical language formed between traditions spanning Ottoman, European, and beyond.

Timed to coincide with the festival of Eid al-Adha, the program situates itself within a living cultural moment, while drawing on practices that long predate modern categories of genre or geography. 

A Continuum of Traditions

At the heart of the program is a dialogue between systems of sound.

Basar’s work moves fluidly between Turkish maqam, or modal frameworks that shape melodic development, and Western compositional structures. The result is not juxtaposition, but impressionistic integration. 

Improvisation plays a central role. Rather than ornamenting a fixed text, improv guides the listener through shifting tonal centers. For audiences familiar with early music’s reliance on unwritten practice, this approach will feel familiar.

Turkish Music and the Artistry of Didem Basar

Rooted in the classical traditions of Turkish music, Didem Basar’s work draws on the makam system—a nuanced framework of melodic development that shapes both composition and improvisation. For listeners attuned to early music, makam offers a compelling parallel to pre-tonal modal practices in Europe, while opening onto a distinct expressive vocabulary defined by microtonal inflection, rhythmic cycles (usul), and ornamentation as structure rather than embellishment. 

A leading kanun performer, composer, and educator, Basar has been widely recognized for her work bridging Turkish and Western musical traditions. She is a founding member of the ensemble Constantinople and serves on the faculty at the University of Toronto, where she directs the Middle Eastern Music Ensemble.

The Kanun and Its Sound World

The kanun, a plucked zither central to Ottoman and Middle Eastern traditions, anchors the ensemble’s sound. With its microtonal flexibility and percussive clarity, it allows for a rare level of nuance in pitch and articulation.

An Ensemble of Familiar Voices

Joining Basar is a quartet of artists well known to MB1800 audiences through the celebrated Constantinople programs: flutist Guy Pelletier, cellist Dominique Beauséjour-Ostiguy, and percussionist Patrick Graham. 

Early Music, Reframed

Levantine Rhapsody sits squarely within MB1800’s broader curatorial vision: to present early music not as a closed canon, but as a network of practices shaped by exchange.

Long before 1800, musical cultures across the Mediterranean and beyond were in sustained contact—through trade, diplomacy, migration, and empire. Modal systems, instruments, and repertories traveled alongside people, leaving traces that are still audible.

Hearing Across Time

“Continuum is the cry of all those who have died and been forgotten,” Basar writes—a line that resonates beyond the program itself. 

Join Music Before 1800 on Sunday, May 31 at Corpus Christi Church. Reserve tickets.