SONG REVIEW 🎵📝 Cem Barış Çetinkayalı - Irmak
Cem Barış Çetinkayalı - Irmak
Alternative/Alt. Rock
TR
Overall Impression: There is something wonderfully untamed about “Irmak,” the latest guitar instrumental from Cem Barış Çetinkayalı. Rather than approaching the guitar with a carefully mapped-out route, Cem appears to throw open the doors and simply follow wherever the music decides to wander. The result is an open-sounding, freestyle excursion into world music territory, one that places spontaneity firmly in the driver’s seat. This is music very much written in real-time. Ideas appear, disappear, mutate, circle back, and occasionally take an entirely unexpected turn. There is no obvious safety net of a rigid arrangement dictating where the journey must go, and that gives “Irmak” an undeniably unpredictable character. The predominantly Middle Eastern character of the piece gives this journey an especially distinctive landscape. There is an exotic, emotive quality woven through the melodic language, with certain phrases carrying an almost desert-like mystique, and the modal flavor of the playing gives the music a sense of cultural depth without making it feel overly bound to convention.
Strongest Point(s): The tracks sense of unpredictability is perhaps the instrumental's greatest appeal. Cem allows his ideas to breathe rather than forcing them into predetermined boxes, creating the sensation of a musician discovering the piece at precisely the same moment as the listener. There is a sense that each phrase is being considered, tested, and then followed down whichever rabbit hole seems most interesting. In a more conventional composition, rehearsal and repetition can sometimes sand away the spontaneity of an initial idea; here, Cem does the opposite. He leaves the doors unlocked and allows the music to retain that sense of discovery. The guitar becomes less of an instrument being commanded and more of a conversational partner, with Cem responding to his own musical thoughts as they emerge. Despite the free-form nature of “Irmak,” there is still a fascinating amount of real-time development taking place beneath the surface. Cem doesn't simply throw one unrelated phrase after another into the musical stream. Instead, ideas will often emerge organically before being revisited and examined from different angles. A melodic fragment might appear almost casually, only for Cem to return to it moments later and stretch it out; a rhythmic figure can become the seed for another passage, while a thematic idea is subtly reshaped as the performance progresses. Cem explores these possibilities melodically, rhythmically, and thematically, allowing small musical seeds to grow into larger branches before moving on. There is a rawness around the edges that comes with performing without the rigid guardrails of a predetermined composition. Certain ideas may occasionally falter in their rhythm or intonation, and some passages feel more tentative than others. But these imperfections are almost inseparable from the musical philosophy at work here
Target Audience Appeal: Fans of the more open-sounding style of instrumental guitar will find some extremely interesting ideas here.
Artist target suggestions: Mark Barnwell, Ardeshir Farah, David Correa, Johannes Linstead, Incendio, Kaweh
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About the Reviewer:
Andre is a freelance session guitarist, composer, and sound engineer based in the U.K. Having studied music production and composition at a degree level, he has taken his passion for all things audio-related to a level that has allowed him to become both a competent musician and performer. Being a self-confessed "Guitar Nerd" Andre has been continually studying the guitar as well as teaching it, helping students learn the instrument, develop their songwriting, and become proficient in home recording.
