I Fucking Did It! I Am Happy.

Yalnızlaşamayan insan özgürleşemez. (One who can't get alienated can't get liberated.) Mustafa Alp Çığman

I'm a native of Kadiköy/Moda/Fenerbahçe districts of Istanbul. I was reborn in Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus and I finally found my home in America.

My first instrument is mandolin, and then I jumped on to classical guitar, in high school bass guitar. I am a punk, a metal head, a rocker but where my heart truly lies is at the Turkish folk music (Türküler.) My great-grand mother, Hatice, played saz in her native village Doydum of Malatya, singing and crying her sorrow out (while also brewing her own booze at home.) This is the story I grew up hearing from my mother, Hicran. I'm pretty certain that this is where my melancholic genes are coming from.

I am a self-taught musician, except a few private lessons here and there. I played bass most of my life but I decided to finally pick up the Saz a few months ago. I am very new to this instrument and to singing. I am again teaching myself. I am no where near being a talent, I just do this for two reasons: because I fucking can, and I want to share the good vibes with good people.

I left my family home and my place of birth at a very young age and never looked back. As a result of pschological and physical abuse and traumas caused by the culture I grew up in, both on a family and a larger, cultural scale, I suffered heavy depression, OCD and CPTSD, and ended up going far far away from home to start my life from the scratch. I ended up in the U.S. Life as an immigrant was not easy at all, it was truly a very lonely existence. At some point around two thousand and seventeen I had a major nervous brake down and reached out for help. Through years of therapy, meditation and medication (which I call the holy trinity) I found peace and happiness. That was a lot of work, but I did it, I found my home.

When I was growing up the motto that ran my life's narrative were the words I kept hearing from my loving parents " You will amount to nothing in life, you cannot complete any task you have started. Education is a waste of resources on you." I believed them. It took decades to undo this learning. And I persevered. One of the best friends along the way that was always by my side was music.

During one of my visits to my family home in Istanbul, sitting around the yellow, laminate, round table in our tiny kitchen with large windows opening to two sides, me staring at and listening to the segulls squawking on the roof of the building next door, my mom took a puff from here beloved cigarette and said "son, I think it's time we get you a saz" She and I took a trip to the luthiers on the European side of the city the next day and she bought me my saz, the one pictured here on this website. The very next year she died. I was forty something. This saz came with me to the U.S. and left untouched, hanging on a wall for ten plus years. Finally, a few months ago, in the November of two thousand and twenty five, I decided to pick it up and become a saz / bağlama player and a singer of Turkish folk songs. Not because I think I am the shit but because time is passing fast, life is short, and before it's too late I want to do this, I want to honor my mom and my great-grand mother's memory and their heritage.

My biggest achievement in life has been overcoming the self-loathing voice inside my head that ruled my life for decades. I don't pay attention to that voice any more. It is still there, like an unwelcome guest, but I found a much better inner voice than that one, I'm close friends with now, which became a second nature to me. I befriended my saz and my singing voice to always guide me for the rest of my life and to give me the courage to tell myself, against all odds that "I can, I am capable, and I will."

Mustafa Alp Çığman, May 30, 2026, 4:37pm, Watertown MA