As the music and the dance have never been separated each other since the roots of tango thus TangEsta forms its repertoire from the leading dance orchestras of the Golden Era like D’arienzo, Di Sarli, Troilo, Pugliese, D’angelis etc. The orchestra also plays Turkish tangos with new arrangements in Argentinian styles and motivating composers to write new tangos as well as playing original Argentinian tangos in their authentic state.

TangEsta has been regarded as one of the most promising tango orchestras by the listeners from all over the world with their passionate playing and danceable (para bailar) repertoire since their debut in 2015 and became one of the most favourite tango orchestras in a very short time in Turkey. Also, they have been invited to attend an online tango music festival as being in the category of Milonga Orchestras (Orquestas Milongueras) that is organized for the International Tango Day in Argentina in 2020 during the Covid-19 pandemic in which they also performed a Turkish tango which is arranged in the style of para bailar. They performed in several concerts, festivals and milongas and released their first album “Tangueros De Estambul” on 2017.

Besides performing as a milonga orchestra TangEsta also played in concerts and shows and the band can be extended from a quartet up to sextet or septet. As the year 2021 being the 100th anniversary of Astor Piazzolla’s birth the orchestra played as a quintet of a concert series of Astor Piazzolla’s compositions of his original arrangements for his legendary New Tango Quintet.

TangEsta continues to contribute to the intercultural richness of tango which is a dialect of the universal music language, from Turkey.

He took part in many tango projects as founder and performer. He learned to play bandoneon himself. Afterwards, he went to CODARTS Rotterdam (Netherlands) to study bandoneon and tango music. In CODARTS, the unique institution for academic tango education in Europe, he also studied tango history and theory, composition, arrangement, orchestration in styles with maestros Gustavo Beytelmann, Leo Vervelde, Victor Hugo Villena and more.  Then he went to Buenos Aires (Argentina) and deepened his studies with legendary maestros such as Walter Rios, Roberto Alvarez and new tango musicians as Julian Peralta, Mariano Gonzalez Calo, Mariana Diez and more. He carried these studies to an academic dimension with his second doctorate (PhD), which he has been awarded with his thesis titled “The Orchestration Styles in Argentinian Tango Music” as “The Best Doctoral Thesis of 2019” by İstanbul Technical University (ITU) in 2019. In addition to his artistic works, he continues his academic career with his publications and teaching at university. He also produced and presented the tango program El Fueye on radio between 2019-2021.

He founded TangEsta in 2012 and he trained the musicians who wanted to take part in the orchestra in tango music. Besides leading the orchestra he’s also writing the arrangements and composing for the band.

BATURAY YARKIN

Pianist, composer

Baturay Yarkın was born in a family, full of generations of musicians. He resides in İstanbul, where had been a historical and cultural center of the various civilizations. When he was 6, he was accepted to Istanbul University State Conservatory, Department of Classical Piano part time program. When he was 13, he trained with his teacher Meral Yapalı for European Young Pianists Competition and he came in 3rd place.

After graduating from Marmara University Industrial Engineering & Istanbul University State Conservatory Piano Department, he was admitted with scholarship to BAU Jazz Enstitute in İstanbul. He was much appreciated during his performance with his jazz trio as a young jazz artist at Istanbul Jazz Festival and recorded his album Su (2018). The artist who had attended to the workshops of world-wide known jazz musicians such as Barry Harris and Eric Alexander, gave 15 expositional concerts with his band Baturay Yarkın Trio & Nağme Yarkın within his project The Colours of Anatolia (2019); which combines Jazz and Turkish music and was sponsored by Republic of Turkey Ministry Culture and Tourism, in 15 universities in various cities in Turkey.

He and his sister, Nağme Yarkın decided to collaborate together, launched Yarkın Duo in 2016 and published their debut album One (2017). After the release, they performed at the stages of several festivals in England, France, Holland, U.S.A., Italy, Albania, Croatia; joined the Silk Road Ensemble, 3. Global Musician Workshop established by Yo YoMa; were also invited to U.S.A. to give the workshop and have festival concerts in the following years.

The artist started to study Argentine Tango Music with Ortaç Aydınoğlu and performed as a pianist for Tangueros de Estambul (2017), which was the debut album of TangEsta. Meanwhile, he decided to base his thesis on Tango Music during his master program, ITU Music Theory and Composition Deparment and he advanced his skills studying with Gustavo Beytelmann and Wim Warman in the Netherlands, where he was an Erasmus Exchange student. He performed in various concert halls in the Netherlands with tango orchestra OTRA, assembled by Leo Vervelde. He completed his master thesis, “The Examination of Piano Performance in Tango Music in terms of Carlos Di Sarli, Anibal Troilo and Horacio Salgan” when he came back to Turkey. The projects he performed as tango pianist are Şevval Sam’s album called as “Tango” and “A New Year’s Concert from Louis Armstrong to Astor Piazzolla” concert happened in CRR.

The artist, who has been the lecturer in Jazz Department of İstanbul University State Conservatory and has 6 personal albums, continues to work on albums, concerts and his doctorate thesis.

GÜLFEM GÜLER

Violin

She was born in Kadıköy, Istanbul. She started his education in classical music by taking violin and solfege classes. She continued her education at the part-time violin departments firstly at Istanbul University State Conservatoire, then at Kocaeli University State Conservatoire between the years 2003 and 2009. In 2013 she was awarded a place at the undergraduate department Kocaeli University State Conservatoire and she graduated in 2017 from the violin class taught by Gonca Bilget.

In the year 2016, she was admitted to the Frederyk Chopin University of Music in Warsaw, Poland as part of the Erasmus+ program. She completed the academic year 2016-2017 in this university in the class of Krzysztof Bakowski, one of the group conductors at the Warsaw National Philharmonic Orchestra. She had private tuitions with several violin artists and attended masterclasses. Also, she did recordings for the soundtracks of various theater plays.

In the year 2018, she was entitled to furthering her studies at the Graduate Department of Anadolu University State Conservatoire with Hüseyin Bülent Akdeniz. At the same time, she also performs on stage in Eskişehir, Kocaeli and İstanbul with various orchestra and chamber music ensembles.

She met Ortaç AYDINOĞLU in 2018 and started her practice in tango music. Since 2019, she has been the violinist at TangEsta and continues to perform at various concerts with this orchestra.

AYDIN BALPINAR

Double Bass

He was born in 1988 in Istanbul. His artistic journey started at a young age with courses in ballet, piano and violoncello.  After completing his part-time studies in violoncello at the Mimar Sinan University State Conservatoire, he became interested in double bass. On a sudden decision, he was enrolled at the Istanbul University State Conservatoire Double Bass undergraduate program. He furthered his education at CODARTS, The Netherlands, where he went to for one year as part of the Erasmus exchange program and stayed for four years in total. Thus, he completed his undergraduate education in both Rotterdam and Istanbul.  

Within this period of time, he performed at several local and international festivals along with various orchestras and projects, finding the opportunity to work with many local and international conductors. Between the years 2008 and 2017, he served as a double bass artist for the State Symphony Orchestras of Antalya and Bursa. In addition to music, he also took on roles at the Sound and Foley departments in the movie industry.