Edition: V
Bio/Studies
Can Bilir (b.1987) has studied composition and classical guitar in Hacettepete Ankara State Conservatory and Bilkent University Music Prep High School in turn. He completed BM degree in the honor list of Bilkent University in 2010. Through his education he has studied composition with Turgut Pogun and classical guitar with Kursad Terci and Kagan Korad. In this period of time, he has participated to workshops of musicians like David Lang, Al Di Meola, Stephen Hartke, Roland Dyens, Richard Ayres, Andrew York, Costas Cotsiolis, Aniello Desiderio, Marco Socias, Kamran Ince, Michael Ellison, and Par Lindgren.
Recently, Bilir is pursuing doctoral studies in composition department of Bilkent University under the guidance of Asst. Prof. Tolga Yayalar. He is also teaching composition, harmony, ear training. As a Fulbright Scholarship grantee, he is going to pursue his doctoral studies in the US in fall 2014.
Career
He has played classical guitar in nationwide festivals as soloist and with chamber music groups. He has also sung with award winning Bilkent Youth Choir for eight years. Bilir was awarded by various music prizes such as: 2013 Iron Composer Instant Composition Competition 2nd Prize in OH, 2012 “Counterpoint – Italy” Composition Competition 1st Prize in NY, 2012 International Music Festival Composition Competition 3rd Prize in Mersin, Yildiz Technical University 2009 Composition Competition 3rd Prize in Istanbul, 2005 Yildiz Technical University Classical Guitar Performance Competition 3rd Prize in Istanbul, chosen for Turkish Radio and Television Corporation 40th Years Project in 2009, and became a finalist of 2010 Besom Kızılay Rotary Club Composition Competition in Ankara.
His work Resurrection for choir and percussionists is premiered by well-known Turkish conductor Işın Metin with TRT Polyphonic Choir in Ankara. Breath for brass trio performed by Joe Drew, Alan DeMattia, and James Albrecht in Cleveland. The premiere performance of Hypertext II is done by flutist Linda Wetherill in Composer’s Voice Concert Series in New York City. Guitar Quartet which is commissioned by Safa Yeprem is performed by Yeprem and Kennesaw State University Guitarists in Atlanta. Some other notable performances of him are: Three Short Statements for piano by Prof. Metin Ülkü in Ankara, String Quartet Ib by “Ankara University Soloists” in Cappadocia, Decet No. II “Istanbul, Three Portraits” (commissioned by KK Festival) by conductor Jean Philip Calvin in Cappadocia.
Can Bilir has presented his paper “The Medial Caesura Rhetoric in Beethoven Symphonies and their
Deviations from the Norm” in Istanbul Technical University “Music and Theory” musicology symposium in March 2013. Between 2012 and 2013 he worked as the assistant of composer and theoretician Gökçe Altay in Harmony track.
Recently, Bilir is pursuing doctoral studies in composition department of Bilkent University under the guidance of Asst. Prof. Tolga Yayalar.
Notes on the Musma Composition
Quintet II
I have started to the sonic design of this work by considering the phenomenon of water which is the theme of the 5th Musma festival. Nevertheless, in the context of semiotics, I decided that it is impossible to express any external being by using sound. I believe a musical work is able to create its own drama independent of any secondary referential. Thus, I did not assigned any specific title to the work other than the description of the instrumental group. Not like an external referential, the flow of the water merely has influence on me involving the flow of the time and intertwined connection between the sub-units in the of the form of the space of the water’s itself. Summarily, my second Quintet for wind instruments is the narration of the clash, flowing, and the transformation of some certain sound objects throughout a proportion of a limited time exists in the absolute time which are observed from different perspectives.”
