About Me
Together with his brother, Bilal Karaman has started playing the guitar at the age of 11. He has self thought him self how to play guitar in a short while. After advancing in electronic and classical guitar techniques he has started to read notes and composing. The guitar, which he has seen as a toy until he was 15 has become an important part of his life after meeting Dogan Canku (composer and classical guitar player).
He has studied flamenco techniques and played with Dogan Canku for a short while. His interest in improvisation has forwarded him to jazz music and soon he has started to take part in the jazz ensembles at Academy Istanbul. At the age of 19 he’s been accepted to Bilgi University Department of Music with a full scholarship.
At the university he has studied ear training and private guitar lessons with Donovan Mixon who has a worldwide fame with his ear training book and the techniques developed for improvisation and guitar training. He also had the opportunity to work and improvise with the world famous sax player Ricky Ford. He took part in Lawrence Butch Morris’s ensembles, took rhythm classes from Can Kozlu and studied Indian and African rhythms, studied jazz history with James Lewis, improvisation, transcription and group work with Imer Demirer. Jazz guitar with Neset Ruacan; fretless guitar and classical Turkish Music with Erkan Ogur.
Along side of his university he also had the chance to study advance harmony and new music with legendary pianist and composer Aydin Esen. At the age of 23 he went to Austria to take part at the workshops where he had the chance to work with Wolfgang Muthspiel which is one of the best guitar players of our time. There he also had the chance to share the same stage with many talented musicians.
Some of the important musicians he shared the same stage with are; Selçuk Karaman, Aydin Esen, Randy Esen, Volkan Öktem, Neset Ruacan, Nedim Nalbantoglu, Senova Ülker, Buzuki Orhan Osman, Ricky Ford, Turgut Alp Bekoglu, Alp Ersönmez, Tony Jones, Sarp Maden, Cem Aksel, William R. Cardoso, Izzet Kizil, Jamey Haddad, Sertab Erener, Yahya Dai, Burak Bedikyan...
The 27 year old guitar player still lives in Istanbul, attracting the attention of many national and international musicians. Getting the appreciation of World famous guitar players such as Wolfgang Muthspiel, Kurt Rosenwinkel; in Turkey the young musician is also recognized to be one of the most appreciated guitar player by Aydin Esen, Erkan Ogur, Neset Ruacan, Sarp Maden and many more.
Along side his advance musical knowledge and technique Bilal Karaman, thanks to the interest to different music styles has developed a unique style and plays classical, electronic and fretless guitar. Bilal Karaman with a unique approached to Classical Turkish Music aims to carry the Turkish Music to a different level. Karaman uses modal melodic motives, modern melodies and improvisations in his compositions.
