Rating : - Cantemir, Great Sultan, Louis XIV and Peter the Great
Firstly, I want to thank Lux Musica and Ihsan Ozgen for recording such a beautiful exquisite album.
Moldavian prince Dmitrie Cantemir stood on cross-roads between the West, Russia and the Orient on the turning point of history - end of the 17th - beginning of 18th centuries. Philosopher, musician and musicologist, orientalist and politician - charismatic and interesting person.
Ihsan Ozgen and Lux Musica decided not to re-create authentic Turkish folk sound of Kantemir`s music, but to incorporate fantastic sound of Turkish string instrument kemence, which reminds crying human voice, and other Turkish instruments into the European ensemble Lux Musica (flute, violin, viola, lute, early guitar, percussion, harpsichord, virginal). Idea is to present the music by Kantemir as synthesis of European and Oriental cultural traditions, to imagine real concerts of his daughter Maria (who played harpsichord) in the court of Peter the Great in Russia, and to describe the cultural context of Kantemir`s music.
You would hear music by Kantemir himself, European "Turkish" style melodies of the 17th century by Lully (melody for famous play by Moliere "Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme"), Marin Marais, Ben Johnson, Moldavian folk dances - so this programme wouldn`t be boring for you. I don`t agree with the previous reviewer - to listen to whole CD of authentic Turkish material - it`s a real hard work for European, Russian or American lover of classical music. That`s why I think that Ihsan Ozgen and Lux Musica were right.
So listen to this beautiful music and read a good novels by modern writers devoted to problems of relationships between Orient and Occident - try works by Amin Maalouf, Orhan Pamuk, Milorad Pavic.

Very beautiful album!

P.S. Addition to the text in the booklet. There stated that "Kantemir betrayed Sultan". Let`s be objective - history was more sophisticated. Don`t forget that Kantemir lived in Istanbul as the hostage to guarantee the loyalty of his native Moldavia to the Ottoman Empire. As he wrote in his memoirs, when he was selected by the Sultan to be a ruler of Moldavia, he was informed that he should make a "gift" to the Court - to pay a sum of money. And the sum of this "gift" was very high. Kantemir understood that he should raise the taxes in Moldavia to collect this money. So the choice was - to betray Sultan or to betray his native people. Ruler of Vallachia (modern Romania) sent a letter to Kantemir and invited him to join the revolt of the Orthodox Christians against the Ottoman rule. They secretly asked Tzar Peter the Great to help them. But when the Russian troops started their expedition, Vallachian ruler, who provoked Kantemir, informed Sultan about this revolt and of course rejected to participate in it. So Kantemir in 1711 had no other choice than to join Russian troops and after the unglorious end of this expedition (there were no any revolt) - Kantemir with his family fled to Russia. His life was saved by Peter the Great, because Ottoman powers demanded to return Kantemir to them (of course he would be killed) as condition of peace treaty with Russia.
His son Antoich became Russian poet and diplomate. In Paris he was close to writers and poets of the French Enlightenment.