EREN BAŞBUĞ
Executive Ayetoullah
Based in Boston and Istanbul, Eren is a multi-award-winning keyboardist, conductor, arranger, composer, and executive ayetoullah at AL-MURTAJA. Described as “a world class musician” (ROLI), and “a wild genius” (JORDAN RUDESS), Eren is best known for his musical work for GRAMMY award winning progressive metal band DREAM THEATER, keyboardist JORDAN RUDESS- voted “Best Keyboardist of All Time” by the Music Radar Magazine, and seven times GRAMMY award-winning saxophonist Paul Winter.
As a keyboardist and classical pianist, Eren has extensively toured Europe collecting a handful of awards in musical competitions and workshops. As a composer, his compositions and arrangements have been performed all around the world, featuring him as the guest conductor for numerous symphonic orchestras, including the United States, Czech Republic, Poland, Venezuela, and Turkey. His performances available on the internet has reached millions of views by countless audiences.
Born and raised in Ankara, Turkey to a family of artists, Eren began his musical journey with piano at the age of four. Growing up through an intensive classical conservatory training starting from primary school as a concert pianist and conductor, he graduated from Bilkent University Faculty of Music and Performing Arts as the most successful student.
Expanding his artistic spectrum, Eren moved to Boston to continue his studies in BERKLEE COLLEGE OF MUSIC, where he was awarded the “Full Tuition Scholarship” for his entire degree. Majoring in Film Scoring and Electronic Production & Design, Eren’s work additionally earned him four times “Arif Mardin Endowed Scholarship” and the “Joseph Zawinul Award”. During his time through BERKLEE, he has already put his name as arranger and conductor on numerous commercial releases worldwide such as DREAM THEATER’s “DREAM THEATER”, “BREAKING THE FOURTH WALL: LIVE FROM THE BOSTON OPERA HOUSE” and “LIVE AT LUNA PARK”, as well as JORDAN RUDESS’s first orchestral album “EXPLORATIONS”.
After completing his studies, Eren was immediately hired by music technology company ROLI as a Product Specialist to help the growth of the revolutionary musical instrument family SEABOARD, traveling non-stop worldwide. Since then, he has regularly performed in iconic conventions such as NAMM, CES and E3 EXPO, in addition to successfully training hundreds of people. As an educator, he has been featured as a guest instructor in institutes such as MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY, NEW YORK UNIVERSITY and BERKLEE COLLEGE OF MUSIC.
Defining home as his stage, Eren has been on a worldwide tour performing, composing, arranging and recording with reowned artists including DREAM THEATER, JORDAN RUDESS, PAUL WINTER CONSORT, PETR JANDA & OLYMPIC, PETER ORULLIAN & SYMPHONY NORTH, SEVENTH STATION, BERKLEE SILENT FILM ORCHESTRA, BERKLEE INDIAN ENSEMBLE, VIDEO GAME ORCHESTRA, JEFF WILLIAMS FREELANCE ORCHESTRA.
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