The 'meşk' Method of Oral Transmission in Ottoman Times and its Revival in Nowadays Turkey: an example for Central Asia?

Among the many oral/aural methods of music teaching that developed in the vast Islamic Art Music (maqâm) world, this article takes into exam the one called 'meşk' that developed in the Ottoman/Turkish musical culture. After a definition of the term, I move to historical evidence derived mainly from the Seray- i Enderûn (‘The Inner Parts of the Palace’), written by Wojciech Bobowski (1610- 1675?) and I focus on the passages from the the Seray-i Enderûn where he describes meşk at the Ottoman court. Bobowski pioneering transcribed in Western staff notation the repertories taught with meşk that he was studying as a young music page-boy at the Court, and this lead to the theme of music writing in Ottoman culture that became the main method for preserving and teaching music in modern Turkey. The article moves, then, to some reflections on the phenomenon of compulsory music writing (and reading) according to Western canons that took place in Atatürk Turkey and on the Ottoman music revival, including meşk system, that took place in the present. I wonder if such a process between oral transmission and music writing/teaching that took place between Ottoman epoch and modern Turkey, with its nowadays cultural revival, can be an example for present Central Asia, which has undergone, in the recent past, the same cultural developments as Turkey.