Ahmet Kaya (28 October 1957 – 16 November 2000) was a Turkish–Kurdish folk singer. Kaya was persecuted by Turkish nationalist celebrities and authorities. Kaya left Turkey in an act of self-exile, and moved to France, where he would shortly after die of a heart attack. He was granted the Musician of the Year Award in February 1999 during a controversial award ceremony involving Turkey's most popular singers, at which he declared that he wanted to sing a song in Kurdish. Ahmet Kaya was born in Malatya as the fifth child of a Kurdish father and a Turkish mother. His father worked at the local textiles factory and the family lived in only one room until in 1959, which was the year the factory began to provide better accommodation to its workers. Ahmet often visited his relatives in the country side where he made his first experiences with music. His uncle Yusuf was a singer and a musician, who inspired him to build his own bağlama. His musical career was also influenced by his father, who bought him a real bağlama, after he had seen Ahmet giving "concerts" to the families chickens with his self-made one. From that moment on, still at a young age, he held concerts for the fellow workers of his father and his first official concert was in July 1966 at the age of nine. His life circled around music, and he toured the region giving concerts and in later years took up a job at a record store where worked after school. By 1977 the family had settled to Istanbul, where he and his father received employment at a phone company which was owned by Malatyans. He served in the Turkish army as a musician in the Army orchestra in Gelibolu and after he married in 1979 he and his wife settled into an apartment in Sarıyer, Istanbul. After the military coup in 1980, his environment became dire as several of his colleagues were arrested and sent to prison. He and his wife divorced in 1981. More information...
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