A 400-year-old sound comes back to life at Yaşar University

A striking instrument with an unusually long neck and huge body is finding a new voice at Yaşar University. The theorbo, a member of the lute family, emerged in 16th-century Italy and became an important instrument in 17th- and 18th-century Baroque music.

It was used in opera, chamber music and vocal works, but remains little known in Turkey. Duru Yavşan, a research assistant in the university’s Music Department, is one of the few musicians in the country who actively performs it.

Yavşan has expanded her academic and artistic work in classical guitar into early music and historically informed performance. She now aims to introduce the theorbo to a broader audience through concerts. Her work is also intended to support new concerts, chamber-music projects and interdisciplinary initiatives focused on early music at Yaşar University’s Faculty of Art and Design.

Yavşan graduated from Başkent University State Conservatory’s Guitar Department. Alongside guitar studies with Cem Çeliksırt, she completed a minor in composition and music theory. For her master’s work, she studied Cemal Reşit Rey’s Concerto for Guitar and Orchestra and revised the guitar part to help make the work performable again and return it to the guitar repertoire.

She is continuing her proficiency studies in guitar at Anadolu University with Professor Emre Ünlenen.