Hakki Cengiz Eren

Guitarist-composer Hakki Cengiz Eren’s music has been performed throughout the United States, Europe, Brazil, and Turkey. He has collaborated with a wide range of internationally recognized ensembles, including Ensemble Schallfeld, Ensemble Móbile, Ensemble Suono Giallo, Ensemble Composit, Schwerpunkt Ensemble, ECCE, Argus Quartet, Meitar Ensemble, Hezarfen Ensemble, and Ensemble Modern. His Luftschloss Passacaglia, performed by Hezarfen Ensemble in Bristol, England, was also featured on BBC Radio 3’s new music programming.

 

In 2017, Eren was commissioned by the Royaumont Foundation to compose a new work for the Meitar Ensemble, a project that subsequently led to a residency at the Camargo Foundation in 2018. His work has received recognition through numerous international awards, competitions, and calls for scores, including the Hans J. Salter Music Memorial Award, First Prize in the MIGF Composition Competition, the ERT Prize at the Città di Udine International Composition Competition 2020, the Peter David Faith Memorial Award, BNMI Call for Scores, CEMI Circles Call for Scores, a Special Commendation at the Kirkoskammer Composition Competition, and finalist distinctions in the Donald Aird Earplay Competition, the mdi Ensemble Call for Scores, and The American Prize in Composition.

 

His music draws on a broad range of influences, including mysticism, psychoacoustics, microtonality, electroacoustic music, and Turkish folk traditions. A recurring concern in his work is the merging of seemingly unrelated narratives: disparate musical entities are brought into contact and made to coexist within a shared, often reflective discourse. Frequently, a fragile or forlorn musical presence emerges—stripped of a stable identity, barely able to justify its own existence, yet persistently attempting to come into being.

 

Eren has participated in numerous international festivals, academies, workshops, and masterclasses, including Royaumont Voix Nouvelles, Ticino Academy, CEME, Sound of Wander, the Darmstadt Summer Course, Festival Mixtur, Impuls Academy, IlSuono Academy, Composit Festival, Musiikin aika, Etchings Festival, Soundscape Festival, and the Los Angeles Micro-Fest. In these contexts, he has worked with composers including Clara Iannotta, Philippe Leroux, Alex Mincek, Pierluigi Billone, Dmitri Kourliandski, Stefan Prins, Simon Steen-Andersen, Mauricio Sotelo, Klaus Lang, Francesco Filidei, Beat Furrer, Franck Bedrossian, Mark Andre, Onur Türkmen, Joël Bons, Brian Hulse, and Michael Quell.

 

He completed his Bachelor’s degree in guitar performance at the Peabody Institute, followed by a Master’s degree in composition at the University of Michigan. He later earned a DMA in composition from the USC Thornton School of Music, where his principal teachers included Stephen Hartke, Donald Crockett, and Sean Friar.

 

Alongside his compositional work, teaching has become an increasingly important part of his professional activity, and he currently teaches in the Department of Music at Near East University.