Report from ICTMD Study Group on Music and Dance in the Turkic World

The ICTMD Study Group on Music and Dance in the Turkic World, established 20 years ago in 2006, celebrated this anniversary with its10th Symposium, co-organized with the State Conservatory of Uzbekistan and with the support of the Ministry of Culture of Uzbekistan, the Union of Composers of Uzbekistan, the Institute of Variety Arts named for B. Zokirov, and the State Academy of Choreography of Uzbekistan. It was in this country, rich in musical and dance traditions, that our Study Group met for the first time.

The Symposium was held from 22 to 25 May, 2026 in  lovely green Tashkent in conjunction with the 90th Jubilee of the State Conservatory of Uzbekistan, the country’s premier institution for higher music education. This led to the choice of a topic on the role of institutions in sustaining and transmitting music and dance traditions. Our main theme “Institutions, Masters, and Apprentices (Ustod – Shogird) in the Safeguarding, Transmission, Research, and Transformation of Turkic Music and Dance Traditions” encompassed several lines of inquiry, examining the issue from various perspectives: 1) Conservatories, Archives, and Other Institutions: Their Role in Teaching, Study, Preservation, and Reinterpretation of Turkic Intangible Cultural Heritage; 2) Modal Music in the Turkic World as Living Heritage: Makam, Mugham, Maqom, Muqam, and Related Traditions; 3) Epics in the Turkic World: Transmission, Preservation, and Transformation of Turkic Epic and Bardic Traditions; and 4) Dance Traditions: Belonging, Memory, Ritual, Expression, and Embodiment in the Turkic World.

This agenda attracted more than 100 scholars, musicians, and dancers from sixteen countries, including Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Canada, France, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, the Netherlands, Russia, Türkiye, the United Kingdom, the USA, and Uzbekistan, who participated in the Symposium. Over four days of intensive activity, study group members presented and discussed more than 12 plenary papers and about 70 sectional presentations, as well as five presentations on new publications. Please see our website https://ictmusic.org/studygroup/turkic to see the Program and the Book of Abstracts.

Meeting in the halls of the conservatory, echoing with student musicians preparing for exams, evoked our theme of transmission, and in his keynote speech, Feza Tansuğ discussed music education in the Turkic world from an anthropological perspective, setting the tone of thinking about how traditional music is moving into the future. The symposium highlighted new research, publications, recordings, and initiatives of Study Group members, and a special session was dedicated to innovative views of fieldwork filmmaking and the first OBA Film & Video Festival, which is set to launch in November, 2026 in Çanakkale, Türkiye (more information on this at https://www.ictmusic.org/studygroup/turkic).

This year, in order to bring people together into a dynamic common space and encourage dialog between scholars and artists, the symposium was held in-person only. Daily master classes were presented by professionals who actively engaged symposium participants and students in their traditions including the Azerbaijani art of Khananda and Tar, the Kyrgyz kyl-kyyak tradition, Tuvan khoomei throat singing, and the Turkish Sivas Halay. Dance master classes were conducted by artists of Tuvan, Andijan, and Bukharan dance.  Music masterclasses and concert performances took place at the concert hall of the B. Zokirov Institute of Variety Arts, while the dance-related masterclasses took place at the State Academy of Choreography of Uzbekistan, increasing the diversity of student participants across institutions.

The symposium also hosted a rich concert program on the theme “Listening Across Generations” highlighting Mugham as living dialogue in performances, including the Azerbaijani mugham ensemble of Gochag Askarov and Malik Mansurov,  “Ustod–Shogird in Encounter: Makam, memory, and improvisation for double-neck divan saz and fretless guitar,” The Fer Bağlama Trio, “Echoes of the Mountains: A Solo Journey through the Zeybek Traditions of Western Anatolia,” and the art of the Kazakh epic. For the “Together Ensemble,” formed at the Symposium, Azerbaijani mugham musicians joined the Mavreghi Ensemble of the Bukhara State Philharmonia in an improvised, living dialogue on stage; later, the Mavreghi musicians and the Bukharan dance ensemble joined the final concert, which developed into a jam session on stage. At the closing dinner, participants also had an opportunity to make music, dance, and sing together. The masterclasses and concerts in the context of the academic Symposium brought to life the diversity of the Turkic world while creating new shared experiences for the Study group.

A particular strength of the event was the creation of a space of encounter for artists with scholars and students as well as artist-scholars who combined papers with practice. This created valuable opportunities for different forms of knowledge and experience to meet within the symposium, in both music and dance. The symposium was also instructive in revealing the continuing work needed to integrate music and dance arts and practices within academic and institutional contexts. Greater attention to movement as an integral part of musical practice, and to the role of the body in music-making may offer an important area for future dialogue within the Study Group. Other challenges the Study Group discussed as vital include differing epistemologies, pros and cons of technology, future directions for traditional music, dance, and epic, changing methods of transmission, and new directions in ethnomusicology.

Thanks to our generous hosts in Uzbekistan, the Symposium offered a forum for the goals of the Study Group to promote scholarship and dialog in conjunction with traditional music and dance artists across the Turkic world and the Diaspora. The Symposium was a site of flexibility and collaboration, exciting discussion, and informal moments of shared music, dance, singing, and conversation that demonstrated the value of creating spaces in which participants from different practices and backgrounds could connect.

At the business meeting the Study Group discussed creating more possibilities for connections for members between our Symposia as well, including online topical Seminars to start this year, more social media connection, and an enhanced website with member activities highlighted.  In addition, the Executive Board has opened two major initiatives, the first OBA Film & Video Festival, and the edited volume Music and Dance in the Turkic World: Contemporary Studies, to be published in celebration of the twentieth anniversary of the Study Group. This volume will reflect both the scholarly legacy of the Study Group and the contemporary state of research in the field and is currently in process to be published.

At the closing session, looking back on 20 years with words from Study Group Founder Razia Sultanova and President Abdullah Akat, there were moments to reflect on how this study group has grown and developed, to remember and honor those who have been lost, and to look forward to our new and continuing activities in the future.

Report from the ICTMD Study Group for Music and Dance in the Turkic World – Authors:

Galina Sychenko, Music Liaison

Sashar Zarif, Dance Liason

Anna Oldfield, Co-Secretary