Ilhan Mimaroglu

Ilhan Mimaroglu was a Turkish-born composer, writer, and photographer who was one of the early pioneers of electronic music as well as producing several important jazz artists during the '60s and '70s. Born in Istanbul, son of an architect, he started as a broadcaster and writer on music in his native land, until leaving for the U.S. in 1955 on the invitation of the Rockefeller Foundation, taking classes at Columbia University in musicology. He joined the Columbia-Princeton Electronic Music Center a few years later — the place to be for the new advances in electronic "tape music" — and studied under the master, and his mentor, Vladimir Ussachevsky. Many of the compositions that he made in this time are available on CRI releases. Among his production work: a seven-year stint at public radio WBAI New York, producing electronic music programs, and working under the Ertegun brothers (also Turkish) for 30 years at Atlantic Records. Here he produced many important jazz records, including those for Freddie Hubbard, John Coltrane, and Charles Mingus, certainly bringing his own ear to their avant-garde leanings. His close relationship with Atlantic allowed him to set up the successful (comparatively so) Finnadar imprint, which released important modern works from John Cage, Karlheinz Stockhausen, as well as himself. Mimaroglu's releases are few and far between, but the major works are still available on CD, either under his own name (the compilations Criminal Record and Outstanding Warrants) or as part of early electronic music compilations. He continued to compose at his home in Manhattan into the 21st century; Ilhan Mimaroglu died of pneumonia in Manhattan in July of 2012; he was 86 years old.