He was born in Istanbul, Turkey in 1892, his father was Serif Ali Haydar Pasha, and his mother was Sabiha Hanim, his father's first wife.
He began to learn the oud at the age of six, and subsequently took private music lessons in Istanbul – he made his first concert appearance when he was only 13 years old.
At the invitation of the Iraqi government, he became the dean of the Baghdad Conservatory in 1936–37, which produced such famous oud players as the Assyrian brothers Munir Bashir and Jamil Bashir, as well as Salman Shukur and Ghanim Haddad.
He married the famous Turkish singer Safiye Ayla in 1950 and died in 1967 in Istanbul.
He was good friends with John G. Bennett who refers to him as "Prens Muhittin Haydari" in his autobiography.