Tarkan Song Theft Update

Posted by Hatice Soylu from Istanbul, Turkey

Song Theft: One Song Five Suspects

Daytime TV show "Duymayan Kalmasın" took up the recent claim of song theft made against Tarkan and declared him innocent yesterday.

This is the second time Tarkan is having issues with music he hasn't composed for his 2017 album; piracy claims plagued his second drop "Beni Çok Sev".

In what feels a repeat of that composer controversy, Turkish streaming site fizy's drop of Tarkan's third video single "Çok Ağladım" came with claims of song theft - but the story is a complicated one, with only Tarkan as the innocent victim.

On 20 April, on the release of Tarkan's video, music producer and composer Volga Tamöz posted a claim that he had warned Tarkan he didn't enjoy "having his music copied", and had felt compelled to break his silence.

Tamöz claimed the music to Tarkan's track was lifted from a song Tamöz had written 15 years ago for Tarkan's pop rival Mustafa Sandal. It was never released by Sandal, because a lesser known Turkish artist had disputed ownership - who then released it himself.

Subsequently, Tamöz took the lesser known artist to court claiming the song had been stolen while they were working in the studio together. Tamöz won his legal battle in 2011, and released his own version in 2015 with male singer Ferhat Göçer.

The original song's chequered history and bitter battle between artists, and claims of damaging careers, all came to light after Tamöz made - what he now calls - an "artist's impassioned plea" to Tarkan online.

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Hosts of the daytime TV show say Tamöz now regrets making the claim. In a report taken with Tamöz at pop singer Demet Akalın's birthday party and aired by the daytime show, the music producer qualified his comments by saying he didn't mean his song had been "stolen".

At the end of the slot, the daytime TV hosts came to the conclusion that although the music and arrangements were similar enough to constitute questions being asked, Tarkan was blameless of any musical theft that may have occurred.

"Çok Ağladım" was composed by Murat Matthew Erdem with musical arrangements by music producer Ozan Çolakoğlu.

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