Press Release
9th november 2019

The Danish-Turkish fusion jazz musician and composer Atilla Engin has quietly died in his sleep after a long illness the 2nd November, he was 73 years old.

Atilla Engin began his musical career in Istanbul, Turkey, where he performed and recorded. In 1974 he moved to Copenhagen, Denmark. Here he formed several orchestras. One of these was “Matao”, with which he released his first Danish album "Turkish Delight" in 1979. Matao played at the famous Danish music-festival Roskilde Festival in 1979. One of the other groups he formed was in his own name “Atilla Engin Group” that released five albums.

In addition to recording and touring with his bands, he also taught at the Conservatory of Rhythmic Improvisation Music for four years with Niels-Henning Ørsted Pedersen and Debbie Cameron, among others. In 1985 Atilla Engin was awarded the title of "Composer of the Year" at Roskilde Festival.

Atilla Engin was chosen to be Denmark's ambassador for the European Music Year 1985. He formed a band of 12 students from the Conservatory of Rhythmic Improvisation Music that toured in Turkey, where they played a joint concert with Istanbul Radio Big Orchestra.

In 1989 Atilla Engin left Denmark and moved to the United States, where he continued to teach and established several bands, including a six-piece group “Turquoise”; and the “New World Orchestra”; and the 14-man big band “The Istanbul Orchestra”, for which he conducted and composed original music. After the terrorist attack on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, the orchestra could not survive. Atilla left the United States in 2005 and moved to Brazil where he formed the “Brazil New World Orchestra”.

One of Atilla Engin's compositions, the work "Turkish Showbiz" from 1985, caused in 2011 Denmark's first lawsuit for illegal use of music sample, as the DJ group Djuma Soundsystem had sampled the theme, and released it under the title "Les Djinns ".

In 2010 Atilla Engin was struck by a brain hemorrhage and thereafter sat in a wheelchair, unable to speak. He died in Paranagua, Brazil the 2nd November 2019.

Press photos and other photos of Atilla Engin can be downloaded here: http://www.meistrup.com/doc/Press-Atilla-Engin.php

PER MEISTRUP PRODTIONS Co.
DK-4673 Rødvig Stevns
www.meistrup.com

Released 9th november 2019.