Piyanist Ibrahim Sen - Sen Ciftetelli Husnusen... Jun 2026

İbrahim Şen uses electronic keyboards to mimic traditional instruments like the High energy:

A related genre that features even faster percussion and intricate brass or synth melodies. PIYANIST IBRAHIM SEN - Sen Ciftetelli husnusen...

To understand the reception of this piece, one must imagine the Gazino (casino/nightclub) culture of 1960s Istanbul and Izmir. These were venues where families and friends would sit at tables covered in checkered cloths, eating meze and drinking rakı, while a stage band played. The Çiftetelli was the peak of the evening—the moment when the professional dancer (or an enthusiastic aunt) would take the floor. İbrahim Şen uses electronic keyboards to mimic traditional

When this piece is adapted for the piano, as Ibrahim Şen does, the focus shifts from the lyrics to the melodic skeleton. The piano becomes the narrator. The listener does not hear the words "You are my çiftetelli," but they hear the lilting, swaying melody that suggests joy, longing, and the hypnotic sway of the dance. The Çiftetelli was the peak of the evening—the

However, Sen did not use the piano to play Chopin or Mozart. He used it to play Oyun Havaları (dance tunes). He developed a percussive, glissando-heavy technique where the piano mimicked the darbuka (goblet drum) and the klarnet . In recordings of “Şen Çiftetelli,” one hears not a delicate classical touch, but a hammering of the bass register to drive the rhythm, while the right hand dances through the Hicaz or Uşşak makams (modes) with a staccato brightness. He was, in essence, a one-man fasıl orchestra.

Sen’s recordings are characterized by: