Why is it called Turkish March?

[ranniks]

Wikipedia says it's not from Turkey, nor is it a music style from said country. So why is it called 'Turkish' March or Marca alla Turca? Wikipedia said something about the classical music style of the 17th and 18th century, but it wasn't really clear.

Would love to know the background behind this song/style/sonata.

[hmpiano]

In Mozart's day the octave section was to be played on a piano with cymbals operated by the knee.

[scherzo123]

I don't know. 

[j_menz]

Towards the end of the eighteenth century, there was a general European fascination with things oriental (and Turky was then regarded as oriental).  New discoveries, and the end of the threat to Europe from the Ottoman Empire, and a general opening up of new ideas that was the enlightenment all contributed to this.

What they lacked, of course, was any actual experience. This was before YouTube, radio, recording, television and even tourism (by and large). Italy was the tourist destination of choice for wealthy europeans, with Greece beginiig to open up for the more adventurous of them. Turkey was still about as foreign as Jupiter.

This fascination with things oriental, though, lead Mozart (always one with a good finger on the public mood) to produce some "turkish" music. The Rondo and the opera The Abduction from the Seraglio.  At best, it's turkishness was based on third hand oral accounts of actual turkish music, but since no-one actually knew any better, that was enough.

[ranniks]

Towards the end of the eighteenth century, there was a general European fascination with things oriental (and Turky was then regarded as oriental).  New discoveries, and the end of the threat to Europe from the Ottoman Empire, and a general opening up of new ideas that was the enlightenment all contributed to this.

What they lacked, of course, was any actual experience. This was before YouTube, radio, recording, television and even tourism (by and large). Italy was the tourist destination of choice for wealthy europeans, with Greece beginiig to open up for the more adventurous of them. Turkey was still about as foreign as Jupiter.

This fascination with things oriental, though, lead Mozart (always one with a good finger on the public mood) to produce some "turkish" music. The Rondo and the opera The Abduction from the Seraglio.  At best, it's turkishness was based on third hand oral accounts of actual turkish music, but since no-one actually knew any better, that was enough.

Thank you so much for explaining it to me!