Anadolu Rock is the movement Istanbul and Ankara university students started in the late 1960s: Anatolian folk melody and modal (makam) system meets Hendrix-era fuzz guitar and Hammond organ. The line-up is standard rock band — electric guitar, bass, drums, keys — with an electrified baglama (saz, long-necked lute) as the featured instrument, often joined by davul (frame drum) and zurna (double-reed) borrowed straight from village wedding music. Melodies come from regional folk songs, usually opening on an uzun hava (free-metre) vocal, sliding through 9/8 aksak beats (2+2+2+3), then landing on 4/4 rock. Lyrics are Turkish and, unlike Turkish pop of the era, address labour, rural depletion, and the state directly. The production is dry and guitar-forward, sharing the sonic universe of late-60s garage and psychedelic rock in the West.

The catalyst was Ankara Radio's Altın Mikrofon ('Golden Microphone') competition (1965-68), which asked young musicians to arrange Turkish folk tunes for Western rock instruments — a national assignment that pre-formulated the genre's whole theory. Erkin Koray had already electrified the saz in 1962; Moğollar formed in 1967 building instrumental templates; Barış Manço scored the first hit with 'Dağlar Dağlar' in 1970. The defining figure was Cem Karaca (born Istanbul 1945, Armenian-Turkish), who rolled through Apaşlar (1967), Kardaşlar (1969), Moğollar (1971) and Dervişan (1973), rewriting the Anadolu Rock template with each band. His left-wing politics ran through 1970s Turkey's student movement; his 1975 'Namus Belası' addressed poverty and honour killings directly. Selda Bağcan was the movement's female pole and its most politically dangerous voice: after the 12 September 1980 military coup, her passport was confiscated and she was imprisoned three times between 1981 and 1984. Cem Karaca himself fled to West Germany in 1979 and could not return until 1987.

In Erkin Koray's 'Şaşkın' (1972) the electrified saz weaves with the Hammond organ from the first bar — the saz's high-register attack is nothing like a guitar's, and that is what makes the track unmistakably Turkish rock. Cem Karaca's 'Namus Belası' opens with low, near-spoken verse phrasing, then the band jumps two octaves for the chorus; that two-tier vocal architecture defined the genre's drama. Barış Manço's 'Dağlar Dağlar' (1970) moves between folk singer-songwriter mode and full rock band; the tension between the two prefigures his later pop career. Selda Bağcan's voice sits in a wide, warm room reverb rather than close-miked — that spatial quality is Turkish 1970s recording practice as much as her signature.

Erkin Koray's 'Şaşkın' (1972) for the electrified saz revelation. Cem Karaca's 'Namus Belası' (1975) for the political and vocal peak. Barış Manço across two decades — 'Dağlar Dağlar' (1970) and 'Gülpembe' (1988) — to see the range. Selda Bağcan's 'İnce İnce Bir Kar Yağar' (1974), which reached Anglophone ears after Dr. Dre sampled it for Beyoncé's 'Sorry' (2016). Late night, loud speakers.

Erkin Koray built his electrified saz himself in 1962; the idea barely existed in Turkish music before him. Cem Karaca's 1979 exile in West Germany connected him to the Brechtian Berliner Ensemble scene; he kept performing to Turkish diaspora crowds in Köln and Frankfurt clubs until Özal's 1987 amnesty. Selda Bağcan's 'İnce İnce Bir Kar Yağar' had been a rights problem for decades; when Dr. Dre wanted to sample it for Beyoncé's 'Sorry' in 2016, he became the first Western producer to reach out to Bağcan personally and clear the licence properly — she has spoken publicly about that experience since. During her 1980s imprisonment period, her LPs were banned inside Turkey, and many surviving copies circulated only through diaspora networks in Germany and the UK.