Both Sides of the Aegean

Hüsnü Şenlendirici is Turkey's big clarinet star, famed for his glitzy virtuoso style and, unfortunately, a tendency for saccharine arrangements at the expense of really gutsy clarinet playing. Happily, this collaboration with the Trio Chios from Greece is a much better affair. Şenlendirici was born in Bergama (below the ancient Greek city of Pergamon) and the Greek island of Chios is not much more than 100km away, so it's no surprise there's a shared Aegean repertoire between them. The clarinettist first heard Trio Chios when they played in Istanbul's Babylon club and they invited him on stage to play with them – the seeds of this CD were sown.

The Trio Chios is made up of lute, bouzouki and violin with Şenlendirici's group including rippling kanun and delicate darbuka percussion. Of the 16 tracks, about half of them have vocals, in Turkish or Greek, and the music is sweetly nostalgic and lyrical, as heard notably on ‘Gel Gel Kayiçi, taking the perspective of a woman singing to a boatman who she would like to take her away from the harem. There are some fine instrumental solos on kanun and bouzouki and, of course, clarinet – in the rebetika song ‘Iroini Ke Mavraki’ (Heroin and Weed) for instance. Şenlendirici doesn't dominate and his playing is rather sweet and well-behaved. However, his Aegean clarinet style is better heard in recent Kalan recordings with the wonderful accordionist Muammer Ketencoğlu.