Salih Korkut Peker, who began his professional music career in 1998, combines various genres, including grunge, blues, rock, arabesque, rebetiko, and bozlak, by utilizing the ‘live looping’ technique with new-generation hybrid instruments such as the cümbüş, fretless guitar, çağlama, and divane on his one-man stage.
Salih Korkut Peker worked as a musician, songwriter, composer, and arranger in the Istanbul Arabesque Project band between 2009 and 2017, with four albums and 1 single. He gave hundreds of concerts with the band in Turkey, Germany, Belgium, and Australia. The musician, who performed in essential festivals in Turkey, the Netherlands, Belgium, Hungary, and Tunisia with the Izmir-based bands “Yasak Helva”, “Duble Salih”, and “Çalgiya Izmir”, released an album with these bands.
In 2019, he participated in the symphony “Aşık Veysel Humanity Trial,” composed by Ekin Eti, playing his baglama. At the end of 2019, he participated in the psychedelic musical Serenade, written and directed by Tamer Yiğit, which was staged at the Berlin Hebbeltheater alongside six musicians from Turkey, Italy, Germany, and Slovenia, both as a musician and an actor. The musician, who has also written all the music for the absurd comedy series ‘Dünya Hali’ broadcast on TRT 1, also took part in the theatre director Emre Koyuncuoğlu’s plays ‘Kimse Öyle Şeyleri Konuşmuyor Artık’ (with Tamer Yiğit) staged at Istanbul City Theatres and “Halide. Words of Flame” staged at Munich Kammerspiele.
Salih Korkut Peker’s first solo album ‘Denize Dik’, which he described as ‘a blues and grunge album with Anatolian roots’, was released in September 2020. In this album, the Nirvana classic “Something in the Way,” which he interpreted with actor Serkan Keskin and incorporated the electric cümbüş looping technique into its arrangement, made an impact in various music circles. In 2021, he shared his music and connection with the cümbüş with a broad audience through the programme Cümbüşün Peşinde, which he prepared and presented on TRT Music. To date, he has performed on many stringed instruments, especially the cümbüş and fretless guitar, in over 70 TV series and film scores. In the film ‘Organised Business Sazan Sarmalı’, Nikriz Sirto was featured in a reggae arrangement. Peker continues his musical journey in the London-Izmir-Istanbul triangle.
