Mehmet Ali Sanlıkol | en

Mehmet Ali Sanlıkol is a Turkish musician and composer.

Sanlıkol started giving recitals at the age of five. Until 1992 he performed classical and contemporary music, going on to study with Aydin Esen, and winning a scholarship to Berklee College of Music.
In his first year at Berklee he was selected (from 3,000 candidates) for Herb Pomeroy's special composition class. In 1996 Sanlıkoll toured Turkey as the Sanlıkol Group. In the following year, he founded the band Audio Fact with Onur Turkmen, and toured Mexico, Argentina, the USA, and Europe. In the same year he received Berklee College of Music's Clare Fischer Award, and completed his degree in Jazz Composition and Film Scoring. He also received a special award for one of his film scores and was voted student of the year in Jazz Composition.

At the beginning of 1998 he was invited to New York to participate in the BMI Jazz Composer's Workshop. He toured Turkey and Cyprus with Audio Fact, and released the CD Black Spot. In 2000 he graduated from the New England Conservatory of Music with a Master's Degree in Jazz Composition.

In 2001 Sanlıkol, along touring with Audio Fact, started deepening his studies in Turkish music, and since then he has performed as a singer and ud/duduk/zurna player in many concerts at venues such as Harvard University, Northeastern University, and New England Conservatory.

In 2002 Sanlıkol was commissioned to write a piece for PALS children’s chorus accompanied by Turkish instruments and a chamber orchestra. The piece, entitled ‘Ergenekon’, was a great success. In 2003 he released his second Audio Fact CD, Asitane, and taught in the theory and music history departments of New England Conservatory. In 2004 Sanlıkol completed his Doctor of Musical Arts Degree in Composition at the New England Conservatory and founded the organisation Dünya based in Boston, Massachusetts.

* His official Web site .