Tolga Zafer - “Music Tech at a Close Range”

İTÜ Dr. Erol Üçer Center for Advanced Studies in Music (MIAM) was established in 1999 as a department of İTÜ Social Sciences Institute. Dr. Erol Üçer, who is a graduate of ITU, undertook the foundership and acted as the main sponsor. The original idea was conceived by Gülsün Sağlamer, the former rector of ITU. Sağlamer suggested Prof. Dr. Kamran İnce and Prof. Dr. Cihat Aşkın the idea to establish a graduate school that gives education in English, and where foreign scholars would be invited to teach and do research. Kamran İnce who thought positively about the idea pointed out to Gülsün Sağlamer that methods developed in the 20th century for graduate-level music studies were only applied in the American educational system that practiced creative approaches to music rather than rote-learning; and that Turkey needed a comprehensive music library. Furthermore, he emphasized that since İTÜ is a technical university, it would be very important to implement the technological aspect by giving electronic, electro-acoustic music, sonic arts, sound engineering and design educations as well. In addition to these areas, the idea of giving music business and management educations was also considered. Eventually, when Dr. Erol Üçer specified that he would completely back up the project that took shape from these ideas, MIAM was founded as Turkey’s first music master’s program (1999) and music doctoral program (2002) that gives education in %100 English language.