ABSTRACT
This essay will discuss the historical background of Kazakh traditional culture,
spirituality, and music, placing Turan’s performance style against this history with the aim of illuminating the various cultural components that contribute to Turan’s overall style and its intersections with contemporary discourses about Kazakh national identity. Through an analysis of the ensembles constituent parts (instrument, musical style, costuming, performance practices), the essay will demonstrate how Turan captures the unique combination of historical nostalgia and highly charged identity politics that characterizes much of the on-the-ground dialogue – as well as state-approved propaganda – concerning Kazakh identity in urban Kazakhstan today.
