Ottoman military band
[1] It is believed that the first "mehter" was sent to Osman I by the Seljuk Sultan Alaeddin Kayqubad III as a present along with a letter that salutes the newly formed state.
[d] In 1826, the music of the mehters fell into disfavor following Sultan Mahmud II's abolition of the Janissary Corps, who had formed the core of the bands.
Today, the music of the mehters is largely ceremonial and considered by many Turks as a stirring example of heroism and a reminder of Turkey's historical past.
Mehter as Ottoman military music arose in the era of Osman Ghazi and had been played in the wars and in ceremonies customarily organized for various everyday purposes.
With Fatih, while the establishment of the empire was developing, a radical improvement began, as well, in the organization of the mehter ensembles within the Ottoman Army.
They are on duty three times a day, in other words they give three concerts, so that public listens to Turkish military music.
Their bands are in Eyüp S, Kasımpaşa (Kaptan-ı Deryalık, the center of [the] Turkish Naval Forces), Galata, Tophane, Rumelihisarı, Beykoz, Anadoluhisarı, Üsküdar and Kız Kulesi .
The studies and compositions of the music teachers of the palace in the 17th century such as Hanende Recep Çelebi, Zurnazenbaşı İbrahim Ağa, Eyyubi Mehmet Çelebi, Solakzade Mehmed Hendemi (who was also a very famous historian) and Selim III, the sultan and one of the great music masters of the 18th century, had influence on the renovation of the mehter bandsmen and the growth of the repertoire.
This well known and traditional organization was annulled while the radical and western European types of reforms took place in the Ottoman Empire in the era of Mahmud II (1808–1839).
It would eventually evolve to become the modern day Harmonic Band of the Turkish Armed Forces, the seniormost and oldest of its kind.
[3] The standard instruments employed by a mehterân ensemble are the kös (a giant timpani), the nakare (a small kettledrum), the davul (a bass drum), the zil (cymbals), the kaba zurna (a bass variety of the zurna), the boru (a kind of trumpet), and the cevgen (a kind of stick bearing small concealed bells).
If the sultan wants to go to the new-palace or somewhere else, he travels at the back of a light galley under the precious dome on the jewel throne by watching the waterside houses, vineyards and orchards and shipyards on the side of Haliç with the accompaniment of only the curazurna and the çifte na'ra performing", while he was talking about the garden of the shipyard in Istanbul.
The curazurna as the small zurna was planned to be added to the military mehter unit, which was intended to be established by Enver Paşa in 1917.
The musical instruments played in the mehterhane of the Ottomans could be classified as follows: Kabazurna, Cura zurna, the Mehter pipe, clarinets Horns (kurrenay), Boru and other trumpets (nafir) (Western natural trumpets or clarions would later be imported) The Kös (large timpani used by some bands), the Davul (bass drum), the Nakkare (small timpani), the Tabılbaz (medium timpani used by most bands), the Def (frame drum) The Cymbals (clash cymbals) and the Çoğan (cevgen, Turkish crescents) The Mehter bands were divided structurally into sections having a commander called bölükbaşı.
In the early 19th century the Vizier's personal band included nine each of drums and fifes and flutes, seven trumpets and four cymbals (plus the optional timpanist).
It is still played at state, military and tourist functions in modern Turkey by the Mehter Band and the troops that accompany it.
The oldest extant marches were written by Nefiri Behram, Emir-i Hac, Hasan Can and Gazi Giray II in the 16th century.
