An example of Ahmed Adnan Saygun’s Serial Approach: String Quartet No. 2, Op. 35

During the times he got training in Paris Schola Cantorum, an early period of is composition, Ahmed Adnan Saygun (1907-1991) targeted to build his music on the foundation of folk music with the effect of the respectable composers there and the nationalist education system of the school. He believed that the future would be formed via tradition; in addition to this, he benefited from innovative approaches in a way that wouldn’t wear out his musical expression and composed works accordingly. He built his works with the values of Turkish folk music and traditional Turkish classical music maqams and us？ls as well as with pentatonism, modality, serialism, counterpoint and tonal elements and didn’t abstain from using the past period composing techniques which would reflect the musical expression and enrich the content. With this article, it is aimed to describe the composition approach and sequential perspective of Saygun via String Quartet No. 2, Op. 35, completed in 1958 which is distinguished from the previous works with respect to its modern language and innovative structure, considered as the last work of the second period of his creativity studied in three periods. In the article; from all musical materials especially folk music and traditional Turkish classical music elements he used in his works, only the sequential ones are included and it is targeted to create a model on how to use especially traditional sequences in a modern approach like in String Quartet No. 2, Op. 35