Okay Temiz

Okay Temiz entered the world in Istanbul during 1939, where early musical exposure came from his mother Naciye, who had received formal classical training. From 1955 he worked as a professional musician while attending the Ankara Conservatory and the Tophane Art Institute, acquiring the knowledge needed to construct his own distinctive instruments. Encounters with Maffy Falay and Don Cherry led him to settle in Sweden, after which he joined Cherry and bassist Johnny Dyani for tours of the United States and Europe, preserved on the 1971 Sonet album Live in Ankara.

The trio Xaba, assembled in 1972 with Dyani and trumpeter Mongezi Feza, issued several recordings, among them Rejoice on Cadillac that same year plus the two volumes of Music for Xaba issued by Sonet in 1972 and 1979.

Temiz launched Oriental Wind in 1974, drawing heavily on Turkish instruments such as ney and gayda—the latter performed by Haci Tekbilek—alongside zurna, kaval, ud, saz, and sipsi. His mother occasionally appeared with the ensemble. He made a point of featuring Turkish musicians to advance their international standing and preserved close links with his homeland; the 1981 Ada release Zikir presents ney virtuoso Aka Gündüz, pianist Tuna Otenel, and leading bassist/arranger Onno Tunc, while the Ada album Karsilama offers an intensified, celebratory treatment of the percussion-and-zurna music that accompanies wedding festivities in western Turkey.

With a collective of gypsy players from Istanbul he recorded Fis Fis Tziganes for Label La Lichere in 1991 and 1992, simultaneously issuing Green Wave on Uzelli. In 1993 he formed the Magnetic Band, whose 1995 Ano Kato album introduced South African rhythms into his work.

After nearly thirty years abroad he returned to Turkey in 1998, drawn by a more receptive cultural atmosphere and the arrival of younger musicians. There he sustains a demanding calendar of teaching and performing, often appearing as a guest with major orchestras or developing projects built around his invented instruments, among them hand-crafted copper drums, the Magic Pyramid, and Artemiz assembled from camel and sheep bells.