Berdi, one of the biggest stars in the Turkmen pop scene

Youth culture, pop videos and cutting-edge technology in Turkmenistan – what sounds like a joke or a science-fiction trip into the year 2100 is actually a reality. When you watch Turkmen TV, you will still think it is a joke. But when you go ‘underground’ on a market in Ashgabat, the capital of this Central Asian country, you will soon come across thousands of CDs and DVDs to choose from with the latest songs and videos of young Turkmen artists. Berdi (26) is the Turkmen equivalent of Robbie Williams. S.T. is a Turkmen rap band and could be called the Beastie Boys of Ashgabat if their lyrics were not only about love. And Mahri (20) is Ashgabat’s answer to Britney Spears, only without the scandals. They all are celebrities in Turkmenistan because of their music, and also because of their high-quality music videos.

The man behind many of the videos is 22-year old Begench Hangeldiogly. Begench studies to become a film director at the Institute of Culture. “I have always wanted to become a video editor. When I was a child, I took four old VHS recorders and connected them so I could edit a film. But I really only started more professional editing with my first computer about six years ago.” Since then, Begench has made a great leap forward. He owns his own small production company ‘Elwan’ now and has a staff of five co-workers including his younger brother who all work out of a rented basement of an old Soviet apartment block in the Eastern outskirts of Ashgabat.“I work hard. I don’t have any days off in the week and I hardly ever sleep more than six hours” says Begench, who is constantly answering calls on his mobile phone while showing me around in his studio. There are different themes of decoration in every single room of the basement he rents for his ‘underground work’. “I am soon going to install a blue box here so I can experiment more with artificial backgrounds. That will enable me to be more creative in the videos”, he says while he shows me the latest videos he edited for Berdi and other stars of the Turkmen pop scene.Everything Begench knows, he taught himself. “You know, you don’t just fall from the sky as a video editor, but you constantly have to keep learning. You have to sit down at the computer hour after hour after hour and just dig deep into the programs and test things out. You have to know all the different effects and what they do. You have to read manuals, you have to stay on top of new developments. And you don’t learn this in the Institute… I recently got connected to the Internet and so now I have even more resources at hand. But also more things to check out and learn.”

Begench has a vision. He wants to study cinematography abroad, “in the USA or even better in Europe”, he says. But he still needs to finish two years of university and has to earn the money to pay for his tuition. When I ask him who the best video editor in Turkmenistan is, he politely says: “There is a handful of good people, but it’s hard to say who is the best. I have a good rating, so I cannot complain.” The rating system is something completely unofficial. That goes for video editors as well as for the artists. Begench says: “There are no official music charts in Turkmenistan and the latest pop videos are everywhere but not on TV. The rating for artists is basically determined by the number of bookings they get for a gig or to sing at a wedding. That’s also how the artist make their money. There is no copyright law here so everybody can copy CDs and videos and sell them. The artists cannot make any money with their music other than with live gigs at shows or weddings.”

For Begench, it works the same way. He produces the videos for the hippest artist and gives five free copies to big distributors. They copy the CDs or DVDs and flood the markets with them where everybody can buy them for between 25,000 and 60,000 manats (between USD 1.50 and 4.00). The more well-known the artists get, the better for Begench, because word of mouth passes his mobile number on and he gets more calls to do more videos.

I still want to get an answer to my question “Who is the best Turkmen video editor?” and try a different approach. I ask Begench, where Berdi, the most popular artist these days, commissions his videos. Now Begench smiles and says: “I have done his last ten videos.”

Ashgabat, the City of Lights (Chris Schuepp, October 2008)

Begench is also very busy with weddings, a big business in Turkmenistan not only for him and his group of cameramen and editors. “I get anywhere from 200 to 1000 dollars for filming a wedding and putting the footage on a DVD. We take a minimum of two cameras to a wedding, but sometimes we have to go with five people and four cameras and mix the images live and project them straight to a big screen at the wedding party. That can take up to six hours, and then we still have to do the DVDs.”

There are certain seasons for this in Turkmenistan, as some months are more popular for weddings than others. Begench films at least five weddings per month on average, but there are also months when he does up to 30 weddings, sometimes even two on one day. But the weddings are just a job. The music videos are a passion. This is where Begench can use his creativity and direct the scenes, shoot the footage and then turn the films into real masterpieces in the editing process. And as the ‘Elwan’ logo and his name always appear at the beginning or the end of the videos, Begench’s rating continues to go up. He estimates that “several hundreds of thousands or maybe even a million” of CDs and DVDs with his videos have already been sold in Turkmenistan.

Video-editor Begench Hangeldiogly (center) with Berdi and Mahri, young pop stars in Turkmenistan

It looks like it is going to be difficult for Begench, the ‘Videobashi’ of Ashgabat, to catch up on the sleep he has missed out on over the last couple of years. And his own wedding also has to be put off for the time being. “First I have to finish university, then I have to go to the army for a year and then we will see.” Right now, he has other things in mind: “I would like to buy a new car, but I think it’s better to invest some of the money I saved on new computers and film equipment. In the long run, I’m sure it will pay off.”

Chris Schuepp works as youth media consultant for the UNICEF Regional Office for Central and Eastern Europe and the Commonwealth of Independent States. Formerly a radio and TV journalist in Germany, Chris worked as Country Director for Internews Network in the Kyrgyz Republic (Central Asia) in 2000-2001 before joining UNICEF as coordinator of the Young People’s Media Network.