Osman Murat Ertel (born 30 March 1964) is a Turkish musician. He is the son of Mengü Ertel and Ülfet Ertel.
He is one of the founders of the ZeN and Baba Zula groups. While he was making improvised music with ZeN, he also focused on his Turkish roots in Baba Zula and composed film and theater music with this group. He also produces music.
Biography
Early life Murat Ertel was born in Istanbul on 30 March 1964 as the only child of Ülfet and Mengü Ertel. His father was an internationally known graphic designer and his uncles, Turhan Selçuk and İlhan Selçuk, were internationally known cartoonist and writer, respectively. Ertel first started playing the xylophone while still crawling as a toddler and continued with his grandmother's harmonica. He also started making music by turning his grandmother Hikmet Selçuk's record player and radio on and off while they was playing and changing the speed of the record player.
To accompany his music with dance, Ertel founded his first group in 1969 called "Mavi Güneş" (Blue Sun). The name of the group emerged when Ertel, who was going to kindergarten, drew a blue sun and was told by his teacher that the sun could not be blue. When his father learned about the situation, he went to Ertel's school the next day and said, "I am an artist; the sun can be drawn as blue or any other color my son wants; do not instill such harmful ideas in my son's mind." Impressed, Ertel named his first band "Blue Sun." It consisted of himself and two of his neighbours, girls named Esra Yazıcı and Aslı Kayabal. They performed their shows to Ertel's household, but the group disbanded in less than a year.
Away from his family, Ertel continued to make sculptures, ceramics and paintings under the supervision of leading artists Tamer Başol, Zühtü Müridoğlu, Kuzgun Acar, and Ali Teoman Germaner. He read poems in primary school and performed theater plays with sketches he wrote. He drew pictures and cartoons of animals and alien creatures, and made posters that were not printed, just like his father. Ertel often read some magazines as soon as they were published because of his mother's cousin Mehmet Benli, who published Vampirella, Jungla and Korku, and his uncle Turhan Selçuk, who drew Abdülcanbaz.
Ertel grew up with intellectuals and revolutionary people of the art world, including Aziz Nesin, Yaşar Kemal, Edip Cansever, and Turgut Uyar, who were his family's closest friends. Ertel also met younger generation artists by watching the rehearsals of Ahmet Güvenç and his band Bunalım, with whom they were neighbors, next to the house described in Bülent Ortaçgil's song "Suna Abla" on Sağlam Fikir Street. Bunalım was one of the first underground and psychedelic bands of Turkey. He continued to draw, sculpt and compose in primary school, and wrote poems and stories. His paintings were first published when he was 7 years old, in the program booklet of the Istanbul State Opera and Ballet's operetta called Polaria. The drawings were later published in Doğan Kardeş magazine. (1971) He produced his first magazine, Ormandaki Fısıltılar, in 5 copies, at the age of 8. He would continue drawing for magazines and books throughout his life.
He was greatly influenced by artists such as Can Yücel, Mehmet Güleryüz, Melih Cevdet Anday, Ara Güler, and Cihat Burak, who constantly came to their house. Among the musicians, he was most influenced by his uncle's close friend Aşık İhsani and Ruhi Su, who would come to his house throughout his life and play all of his albums from beginning to end for his father to design the covers for him. He started listening to the records of artists such as Barış Manço, Fikret Kızılok and Cem Karaca, which he heard on the radio, pushing his family to buy them. Because of his family's passion for art and their artist friends, he spent his life at exhibition openings, theater and cinema premieres, festivals and concerts since his childhood. Starting from rehearsals to premieres, they have seen most leading theater companies like Dostlar Theatre, Kenterler, Nejat Uygur, Müjdat Gezen, Gülriz Sururi and Engin Cezzar, Haldun Taner and Devekuşu Kabare, Zeki Alasya and Metin Akpınar, Ferhan Şensoy from his childhood. He followed these artists throughout his life, going backstage with his father at the end of the plays. They also met with older doyens such as Engin Günaydın, Münir Özkul, Bedia Muvahhit, Semiha Berksoy and Muhsin Ertuğrul. Since Mengü Ertel was a member and one-time president of Sinematek, he watched cinema classics such as Battleship Potemkin or Rashomon many times at a very strict pace. The 8 mm films that his father rented and watched together already at home as a child were also shown in the school canteen again once or twice a week.
While he was going to English High School, he started listening to British and American rock bands such as the Doors, Santana and Pink Floyd. His father bought him his first guitar and he started playing guitar intensively. (1976) He started improvising with Uğur Güracar, Samih Rifat and Ünol Büyükgönenç at his neighbor Nihat Fındıklı's house. As a family, they started going to his uncle İlhan Selçuk's house in Akyaka and going on Blue Cruises by boat with authors such as Azra Erhat and Mîna Urgan. In the same years, Maçka Art gallery was an environment where the family went two or three days a week, and until the 90s, he spent his youth together with artists and scientists such as Füreya Koral, Can Değer Furtun, Seyhun Topuz, Ömer Uluç, Semiha Berksoy, Komet and Erdal İnönü. In 1978, he formed a band called İkide Bir (Two of One) with his high school friend Akın Evliyaoğlu and recorded the improvised concept album Nightwalker on a single side of a cassette. Peker Açıkalın also joined the duo for their second album, but these recordings did not become an album. He took part in theater plays in high school and won awards as an actor under the direction of Faik Ertener. From middle school until the end of high school, he drew a graphic novel called Super Dumb with his classmate Bozkurt Bayer. Over the years, this graphic novel have turned into cartoon strips that are secretly passed from hand to hand by students during class.
1980–1990 In the early 1980s, he formed a band called Dead Rats with Akın Evliyaoğlu, Bozkurt Bayer and Sinan Uzel and participated in the Milliyet Inter-High School Music Competition. However, the group was eliminated due to improvisation. The band, which performed in German high school and a few colleges, disbanded the same year. He worked as a guide for the Hungarian rock band Omega, which came to Istanbul in 1982, and continued working as guide for the events of Bilsak Jazz Festival, İKSV and Pozitif, meeting many artists and watching their soundchecks. He graduated from school with opening the second literature branch in the history of High School with his friends. He entered the academy, Cinema and TV Institute with the highest degree. He studied at the school for two years with teachers such as Lütfi Akad, Süha Arın and Duygu Sağıroğlu, and worked in the laboratory, in the film processing and printing section and in the projection room. In 1985, Akın and Murat started playing their own compositions with Ayhan Sayıner on bass, Serdar Karaoğlu on drums, and Erdin Çeliköz on vocals. This band, which they named TIR, disbanded after a few successful university concerts.
He made his first movie soundtrack together with Akın in 1986. This short film named ‘Yokuş’ (‘the Slope’), was selected as the best film at the Oberhausen film festival. The director was Dilek Gökçin. After leaving the university, he concentrated on music and continued composing.
He composed and improvised music in Kadıköy Çatı Studio with musicians such as Murat Çelik from the band Düş Sokağı Sakinleri on vocals and acoustic guitar, İsmail Taşbiçen on drums, and Serdar Karaoğlu on bass. He drew graphic novels, cartoons and pictures. He started playing anonymously with his friends from high school, Kerem Kırkpınar on bass, Burak Aktay on guitar and Burak Orhun on drums. This was the High school band that would form the basis for ZeN.
He entered the Department of English Language and Literature at Boğaziçi University. He took lessons from Jale Parla, Oya Başak, Ercüment Atabay and Tomris Uyar at this school and graduated. Burak Aktay went to Cairo. The group took the name ZeN at university.(1988) Murat Ertel, who gave this band its name, was influenced by an Iranian friend who said that "if I had a daughter, I would name her ZeN". The girl told him that ZeN means woman in Persian. With the addition of Merih Öztaylan on vocals, they became a four piece band again. Shortly after, with Bozkurt Coşkunoğlu (Painted Bird, Exotic Pi Band) taking over the drums, they gave their first concert at Boğaziçi University Taş Oda. The band's Persian logo was used for the first time in this concert. After this concert, Mustafa Bahar (Edip Akbayram DOSTLAR) took over the bass. At one point, Mehtap Özkan also took part in vocals. Meanwhile, Ertel was elected president of Boğaziçi University Music Club and served as president for several years.
He recorded his first solo album, Büyük Günahlar in 1987, but the album was not released. He wrote about music first in Gergedan (1987–1988) and then in Argos magazines (1988–1990), when Ömer Madra and Enis Batur were the publishing consultants of the magazine. ZeN started giving concerts at Boğaziçi University, clubs and various venues in Istanbul. As a result of Mehtap Özkan's suicide and Mustafa Bahar's disruption of rehearsals, the cast expanded and improvisations increased. They recorded their first album, Uzay 1989, during this period. (1989)
1990–2000 Burak Aktay returned from Cairo and his high school friends such as Orhan Ertürk and Mehmet Levent Akman joined the band. They started showing movies and slides while playing. Tolga Acar was added on guitar. Bozkurt went to the military and was replaced by his student Okan Özpoyraz, who was left-handed like him. The second album, Ku ku ku, was made with this lineup. (1991). He wrote and drew in Arredamento Dekorasyon magazine under the direction of Ömer Madra.
He worked as the editor-in-chief of the illustrated novel magazine RR, together with Sarkis Paçacı, Ergün Gündüz and İrfan Sayar. The magazine was deemed pornographic and fell into the courts, but could not be published after two issues. (1992.)
Bülent Tangay (Maximal Punch Effect) on tenor saxophone and later Serhat Ersöz (2/5 BZ) on keyboard were added to the band and they made the concert album called Cemal with this lineup. (1992) He composed music for Nur Akalın's short films. (1992–1993) He composed music for several stop motion commercials with the animation company Anima. They met Esat Başak and made him the visual artist of the group. He started designing pages for Mondo Trasho, one of Turkey's first fanzines. He moved to Maltepe Süreyya Beach and established Plaj Studio.(1993–2005) The album called 13 was released with the first recordings in this studio. (1993) This album consisted of 12 solo songs by 12 ZeN members and was produced by Murat Ertel. Ertel did not have a song on the album. The album was reproduced in 13 copies. He wrote about music in Studio İmage magazine. He entered Marmara University's Cinema and TV department and graduated from there with a master's degree.
Then he rehearsed and recorded concerts with various groups such as Leblebi and Repertuar Köpekleri. He came up with the name of Repertuar Köpekleri (Repertoire Dogs) (the first and original group) (1993) and with this group they played cover songs in rock n roll and blues style in bars such as Kemancı, Roxy, Hayal Kahvesi in Istanbul and achieved commercial success. After the group disbanded within a few months, two more groups with the same name were established in Istanbul and İzmir.