The harp has always been considered an instrument that fell from heaven, sounding as divine and ethereal as the mythical creatures ranging from the Olympian gods to the angels, sirens and elves said to have played it.

Likewise, harpist Şirin Pancaroğlu is a master of this ethereal sound as Türkiye's leading harpist, blending traditional Turkish music, improvisation, tango and avant-garde genres with a unique mise-en-scene. She is also described as "a great talent on an international scale" by the Washington Post for her powerful and rich tones.

Her journey in music starts at a very early age, as it was engraved in her early life. "Music has always been a part of our family. My father played the guitar as an amateur and he had a deep love of music. As a self-improved person in music, my father always supported me to express my interest and love for music. My mother also played the piano when she was a child. So we had an upright piano in our house and a guitar that my father played occasionally," she said.

"After all, I grew up in a family that always listened to music. If you had a piano at home in your childhood, naturally, you find yourself playing with the keys," she says about her musical upbringing.

"Thus, it was my mother first who noticed my passion for music, especially with my interest in sounds, then she discovered that I have an ability for music. Then when I was 5 years old, my parents led me to start piano lessons. My father has been an incredible support for me on my way to becoming a musician," she said on family's support.

She clearly remembers the performance that she gave in the U.S. when she was a student. The great effort it took to prepare herself for the recital remains vividly in her mind. Yet on the stage, the world consists of just the harp and its melodies, she says, adding: "The stage is a very well-rounded concept. Even the living room of your home can act as a stage."

Even though the tradition of Turkish music mostly does not include songs played with a harp, Pancaroğlu initiated the "Turkish Harp" project, taking her inspiration from an instrument called the "çeng," also known as a Turkish harp, which was a popular Ottoman instrument until the last quarter of the 17th century.

"The çeng is a lap harp and was cherished in medieval Eastern cultures, but somehow it was forgotten afterward. Since 2007, I have carried out various studies to revive this instrument. My confrontation with the Turkish music literature was actually when I was trying to give this instrument a function again," she said.

"Over time, instead of this primitive instrument with certain limits, I have carried out works where I tried small harps and pedal harps, which we call ratchet, as part of this repertoire. I tried to write down the results I have obtained intermittently since 2015 because especially the harpists abroad wanted to play these works and demanded the notes. Yet, when I said that adaptations of the works were in my mind, they were disappointed. That's when I realized I had to write. We can only share this music culture by writing," she elaborates on the project's process.

Despite the challenges, she completed her "Turkish Harp Note Collection" with intense focus in the past weeks, Pancaroğlu says. Also with the support of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism, she prepared an iconic section that she thinks represents Turkish music as 24 sheet music. "This is a catalog in a sense and I hope to continue to develop this catalog with new adaptations and compositions over time. I even think of adding two new chapters, including more modern compositions. In this form, the collection will be published by a music publisher abroad and will be offered to the professional community," she said regarding the project.

Besides her compilation, Pancaroğlu also took the lead in bringing ratchet harps to Türkiye through a pilot project applied in 2005. As pedal harps are quite costly and used only by professional musicians, she contributed to the importing of ratchet harps, helping people to recognize the instrument and play the harp in a short time. In this way, people who could not afford to buy pedal harps had a chance to perform on the instrument, and as it is portable and light, it came into the many different venues of the cities, Pancaroğlu elaborates. A regular harp relies on seven-foot pedals ranging from 47 strings.

"Having knocked down this domino is my single biggest contribution to my profession in Türkiye," she said.

Pancaroğlu will take the stage at CSO Ada Ankara as part of the Başkent Culture Road on Oct. 30, promising an evening full of music in different forms from old to new.

In addition to traditional forms such as saz semaisi and peşrev (instrumental forms in Turkish classical music), dance music and longa, she will also include a few of her compositions; these are compositions in fantasy form in her concert.

"I will play both the ratchet harp and the pedal harp. This is a selection where you can sense all the colorful mosaics of Turkish music. Moreover, when it meets the unique colors and movements of the harp, it is music with a slightly different expression that can penetrate our souls. My compositions are generally fed by tradition yet there is a style that extends beyond tradition, especially in terms of the methods used, but also in maqams. This is natural because I have been blended with Western music culture for many years," she said, hinting at her upcoming performance.

The pieces that she will be performing are also included in the "Turkish Harp Note Collection."