NATIONAL COMPOSITION CONTEST
IKSEV organizes a national composition competition biennially in the name of its founding president Dr. Nejat F. Eczacıbaşı. IKSEV, which has ensured the organization of such a comprehensive competition since 1996 and aims to add new and important links to our cultural life by maintaining this tradition, has undertaken an important role in promoting young Turkish composers through the ‘Dr. Nejat F. Eczacıbaşı National Composition Competition.’ This competition is one of the vital sources of our contemporary music.
Another important feature of the competition is that since 2002, the evaluation has been carried out with a participatory approach. The Selection Committee chooses up to six works from among those submitted to the competition; these works are performed at the Competition Concert organized by IKSEV. The results are determined by the Selection Committee, Orchestra artists and the audience attending the concert. This method applied through the ‘Competition Concert’ by three music-related groups – Composers, Orchestra Conductors and Orchestra artists, and Listeners – has been implemented for the first time in our country in such a competition. The results obtained are beyond all praise. This competition, organized to encourage our young composers, has contributed 160 new works to contemporary Turkish Music to date.
A NEW CALL FROM IZMIR TO TURKEY
Dr. Nejat F. Eczacıbaşı (1913-1993), founder of the Eczacıbaşı Group, used to say,
“The true measure in private enterprise is the level of success in increasing the wealth of society.”
“Dr. Eczacıbaşı had also explained how lasting successes could be achieved: ‘Success belongs to those who can embrace not easy paths, but new and more advanced methods.’ Born in Izmir, Dr. Nejat F. Eczacıbaşı provided a living example of the views he expressed throughout his life. Following his chemistry higher education at Heidelberg University in the 1930s, his master’s studies at the University of Chicago and doctoral work at Berlin University gave him the ability to approach life with a scientific, systematic and universal perspective.
Dr. Eczacıbaşı would never be a person of ordinary details. In every endeavor he pursued and accomplished, he would seek the most appropriate solutions that integrated social responsibilities between the creative individual’s freedom of enterprise and the long-term needs of society and the world. Contributing to ‘a healthier life’ in his pursuits was Dr. Eczacıbaşı’s indispensable principle.
Offering internationally quality products with the most advanced technologies of the era formed an integral part of the Eczacıbaşı Group’s institutional identity and culture from the early 1940s when the first steps were taken.
His father, Süleyman Ferit Eczacıbaşı, one of Izmir’s first certified Turkish pharmacists, always said, ‘Give back to your homeland what you have received from it…’ Dr. Nejat F. Eczacıbaşı tried to apply throughout his life the aspirations of the ‘founding generation’ that recreated the Republic of Turkey from the ruins of an empire.
With Dr. Eczacıbaşı’s pioneering initiatives, the Eczacıbaşı Group’s breakthroughs in a wide range of fields from pharmaceuticals, building materials, tissue paper and healthcare products to capital markets, exports and information communication from the 1950s to the 1990s would thus follow one another for half a century.
Dr. Nejat F. Eczacıbaşı, who united his life with Beyhan (Ergene) Eczacıbaşı in 1946, had his eldest son Bülent Eczacıbaşı in 1949 and his second son Faruk Eczacıbaşı in 1954. Bülent Eczacıbaşı in chemical engineering and Faruk Eczacıbaşı in economics and business administration would successfully complete their higher education and master’s studies abroad and return to the Eczacıbaşı Group as future professional managers.
Contributing to the development of an effective civil society structure in Turkey, in addition to economy and industry, had also been one of Dr. Eczacıbaşı’s main objectives. As Dr. Nejat F. Eczacıbaşı assumed the position of Honorary President, first Şakir Eczacıbaşı and after his retirement Bülent Eczacıbaşı became Chairman of the Board of Directors of Eczacıbaşı Holding, while Faruk Eczacıbaşı and Eczacıbaşı Holding General Coordinator Sezgin Bayraktar assumed the position of Vice Chairman. In all organizations of the Eczacıbaşı Group and in Eczacıbaşı Holding, young generations trained with contemporary methods were fully realizing the transition to professional management within an institutional culture that was open to the world and highly dynamic.
Dr. Eczacıbaşı expressed his memories in From Generation to Generation (1982) and his views in Impressions, Hopes (1994), which he completed shortly before his passing.
As a pioneer who dedicated his eighty-year life to more civilized tomorrows, Dr. Nejat F. Eczacıbaşı also experienced the happiness of seeing that his most cherished aspirations were identical with what he accomplished during his lifetime.”