One Day The Hodja...
~ Playing the Saz ~
At a gathering in the coffee house, they asked Nasreddin Hodja if he knew how to play the saz. Our Hodja, never one to disappoint his friends, said that he did. So, they gave him a saz and asked him to play. Nasreddin Hodja took the saz, placed it on his lap, then picked one string and started to play that string. He was not moving his fingers up and down, left or right; he was constantly plucking the same string, at the same spot.
`Hodja Effendi, what kind of music is this?', protested the patrons of the coffee house, `The real saz players move their fingers about, play different strings. You held on to one string and you are not letting it go!'
`They are moving their fingers about because they are all looking for this very spot,' was the Hodja's explanation, `I found it in my first attempt, why should I let it go?'
© 2001 Lale Eskicioglu
Saz
(From http://www.rainbowcrystal.com/music/music7.html)
The Saz is a chordophone and is a member of the long necked Lute family. Such long necked Lutes have an ancestry that can be traced as far back as the ancient cultures of Babylon and Sumeria. The Saz of Anatolia, likely descended from the Kopuz. The term Kopuz is used to refer to any number of long necked stringed instruments used by Turkish tribes at the turn of the last millennium. Like other ancestral long necked Lutes, the Kopuz had strings of hair and leather bodies. Through the years several new forms of long necked Lutes evolved from these earlier Kopuz. In the 15th century the use of metal strings marked the emergence of the Cogur. The Cogur is believed to be transitional between the Kopuz and the Saz. The addition of metal strings added greater stress to the body. This required that the weaker leather body be replaced by a body constructed of wood. Today the Saz is generally larger than the Cugur. The Saz shares the metal strings and wooden body, but has a longer neck with frets.
In ancient times the Kopuz was believed to have had mystical powers strong enough to protect a warrior if carried into battle. In the 17th century the Alevi and Bektasi dervishes, religious practitioners, traveled the century country side of Anatolia. They commonly carried the smallest the Saz, the Cura to accompany them in their religious hymns. Today the Saz is used in a number of religious ceremonies.
Today the Saz is the most important instrument of the Turkish folk. The Saz may even define the poetic heart of the Turkish people. It would be impossible to find a region, in Anatolia which did not know this string instrument.