Middle East & Jazz

By Stef  

It's been almost a year since the last "world jazz" post on this blog, called "Jazz From The Middle East, Between Experiments & Kitsch". One of the earliest epigone of the genre was Ahmed Abdul-Malik with his "Jazz Sahara" in 1958 leading to Lebanese oud-player Rabih Abou-Khalil, possibly the best known master of the genre, yet who unfortunately keeps rehashing his own kind of musical blend with different line-ups.

Today two albums are worth mentioning, neither experimental nor kitsch, but bading in a warm atmosphere that is welcoming, with strong character and excellent musicianship.


Jan Klare, Ahmet Bektas, Fethi Ak (Meta, 2012) ***½

On this beautiful and unassuming album, German altoist and flautist Jan Klare meets his Turkish compatriots Ahmet Bektas on oud and Fethi Ak on percussion. The music is more Turkish or middle-eastern than jazz, with long improvisations woven around equally long unison lines, full of sad melancholy and joyful passion. The small setting makes for an intimate atmosphere.

Even if the album will not make music history, it has one intoxicating aspect and that is the sheer pleasure in making music together that transpires with every note. Even if this the band's debut album, they have been playing as trio for over ten years, and that can be heard.


Gordon Grdina's Haram - Her Eyes Illuminate (Songlines, 2012) ***½

On this more ambitious project, Canadian oud-player (and otherwise guitarist), leads a band with Chris Kelly on tenor sax, JP Carter on trumpet, François Houle on clarinet, Jesse Zubot on violin and electronics, Tim Gerwing on darbuka, Liam MacDonald on riq, Tommy Babin on electric bass, Kenton Loewen on drums, and Emad Armoush on vocals and ney. In short, some of Canada's more adventurous musicians.

From the very first notes, you can hear the great Arabic sound of main theme and counterpoint, rhythmic changes, orchestral unison and improvisation. Grdina, for whom this is one of many jazz and fusion projects, call this band his avant-garde Arabic Ensemble.

The music digs deep into Arabic cultural heritage, from the traditional Iraqi oud music of Munir Bashir to the vocal and orchestral Egypt of Oum Kalthoum.

Grdina leads his tentet through the real stuff, including the warm vocals of Emad Armoush, full of respect and admiration, yet he adds the temporary touch in the improvisations, which at times go far beyond what you get in fusion.

A heart-warming and powerful album.

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Gordon Grdina - East Van Strings - The Breathing Of Statues (Songlines, 2009) ****

I knew Vancouver guitarist and oud-player Gordon Grdina from his debut album "Think Like The Waves", with nobody less than Gary Peacock on bass and Paul Motian on drums. Quite a feat for a young musician, and one that illustrates the trust these jazz greats have for his skills and potential. And although the album got some favorable reviews, it was still very rooted in bop. Next to his jazz albums, he also created more Arabic music with Sangha, genre-fusing music with Box Cutter, and now he explores the possibilities of a string quartet, with Jesse Zubot on violin, Eyvind Kang on viola, and Peggy Lee on cello, with of course Grdina playing guitar and oud, moving the music away from jazz and into modern classical music and avant-garde, with strong influences from Arabic and Persian music. The combination is not bad at all, it adds the right level of drama and sadness, well balanced with the more cerebral explorations of new sounds and sound combinations. The most beautiful piece is the long title song, the album's pièce-de-résistance, on which the oud's warm plaintive phrasings is supported by the hypnotic and melancholy strings. Despite the typical sound of the line-up, for some ears the breadth of the musical journey this quartet takes may still be too far-reaching, ranging from the ancient traditions of the middle-east to the very abstract, at times dissonant modern music, but Grdina manages to use that scope to his advantage, laying bare an austere yet emotionally expressive aesthetic that unites the various genres on this album. A strong achievement and a nice listening experience.

The Gordon Grdina Trio - If Accidents Will (Plunge, 2009) ***


The Gordon Grdina Trio is a different story. Accompanied by Tommy Babin on bass and Kenton Loewen on drums, the guitarist demonstrates the wealth of idioms he masters, but a little too much. True, each piece of the album is well-played and has musical merits of its own, but it is very difficult to find the commonalities between a 12-minute long oud improvisation - beautiful though it may be - with the harsh, raw and burning modern electric guitar trio tunes with which the album opens. And then we get the compulsory slow blues, and yes we like the blues, but what is it doing here? And then you also get treated to a more melodic post-bop piece to end the album. All nice, but no coherence. The trio can play, no doubt about it. But mixing it all up is confusing to this listener. The album starts full of promise, but then you get the impression that inspiration got lost, and that the band fell back on the more beaten track. The good news however is that with every release, Grdina seems to come closer to creating his own voice. And that's good progress.

© stef

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Music from Israel ...

Despite the horror and human stupidity taking place in Israel and Palestine, there is still good music coming out of the region, and often artists are taking a leading position in fighting for mututal understanding. It is also clear that the events taking place there also affect the music and the emotions with which they're made.

Third World Love - New Blues (Anzic Records, 2007) ***

Third World Love is a band from Israel with Avishai Cohen on trumpet, Omer Avital on bass, Yonathan Avishai on piano and Daniel Freedman on drums. This album is much better than their previous release, because there is much more focus, nuance and emotional expressiveness. It is more jazzy, with great melancholy tunes, incorporating jazz, flamenco, mediterranean, Arabic and jewish influences. It is very mainstream without any pretence but fresh enough to be of interest. Some of the tunes are a little bit bland, such as "Hamina", because this kind of flamenco tune and rhythm we've heard a zillion times before, and the band adds nothing to it, but that should not spoil the pleasure, because other tracks such as the more African "Nature's Dance" or the sad "Beauty of Death" are great.

Listen and download from iTunes.

Amos Hoffman - Evolution (Razdaz, 2008) ***½

Amos Hoffman is an Israeli guitarist and oud-player. The oud is an instrument I really like because of its natural warmth and clean sound. His first release, "The Dreamer", was a jazz guitar album, and "Na'ama" from 2006, on which he already switched to the oud, incorporated more middle-eastern influences, but was still lacking its own voice. Now, with "Evolution", he goes a step further, again with Avishai Cohen (the other one) on bass and vocals, Ilan Katchka on percussion and Ilan Salem on alto flute. Some tracks are hypnotic like the long "The Journey", blending yearning solos with strong rhythmic drive. The music is at its best when it sticks to the more traditional Arabic influences, like in "The Wheel", on which Cohen's bass is instrumental in shaping the overall mood, yet the real highlight is Hoffman's solo piece "Takasin Bayati". Unfortunatly, not all tracks are of the same quality. But overall a worthwhile album.

Listen and download from iTunes.

Yitzhak Yedid - Oud Bass Piano Trio (Between The Lines, 2005) ****½

Moving things up a level is Yitzhak Yedid's "Suite In Five Movements", originally recorded and released in 2005, but since recently also available for download on the internet. Yedid is a very gifted piano-player with a solid classical education, with good knowledge and interest in modern classical music and jazz. On this album, he mixes these genres and adds middle-eastern influences. He is accompanied by Mikhail Maroun on oud and by Ora Boasson on bass. The latter kicks of the five suites with a dark and tremendously powerful bass intro, setting an eery tone and atmosphere. The first piece is hypnotic, with lots of unison melodies for either piano and oud, or oud and bass. Boasson's precision on arco is strong, especially in the highest tones, sounding almost like a cello. She is astoundingly good. The second piece is more ondulating, starting slowly, moving to a loud climax in the middle part, and slowing down again into a more resigned mood. On the third movement Yedid himself demonstrates his skills on the piano (see his intro on the video below), in a composition that starts off more light-footed, yet which is pulled back into a dark and solemn atmosphere when bass and oud join after six minutes (still on the video), yet the piano reacts to this by starting to improvise freely and in full jazz-mode, as he's trying to escape from the gravity created by the string instruments. On the fourth movement, melancholy sets the theme, again with Boasson on a hauntingly beautiful arco bass, and with Mikhail Maroun shining on a long oud solo in the middle part. The last piece is nervous and agitated, and if you want to hear a bass weep, this is the place. Sad, dark but immensly powerful. A major success.

Listen and download from eMusic.

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Amir ElSaffar - Two Rivers (Pi Recordings, 2007) ****½

Lots of world jazz tends to do some work on the surface, superficially blending atmospheres and styles, but luckily once in while a musician manages to delve deep into the music itself, identifying the essence of several musical languages and forms, and truly bringing them together to create a new voice. This album definitely belongs to the second category. Amir ElSaffar, a US-based trumpeter, but born and raised in Iraq, creates his own style, based on the Arabic maqam style, with traditional instrumentation and vocals, but adding the expressive power of jazz instruments and the nervous enthusiasm of jazz itself, with both genres running together or transitioning smoothly into each other to create a coherent whole. This is probably the most successful blend of the genres, next to Rabih Abou-Khalil, that I've come across. As I said earlier, few genres apart from jazz are sufficiently open to integrate other influences without creating musical conflicts. The band consists of Amir ElSaffar on santoor, vocals, trumpet; Rudresh Mahanthappa on alto saxophone; Zafer Tawil on violin, oud, dumbek; Tareq Abboushi on buzuk, frame drum; Carlo DeRosa on bass, and Nasheet Waits on drums. With those musicians, you can go a long way, but El Saffar's trumpet playing is also excellent. He manages to replicate the long deep yearning and plaintive phrases that are so typical for Arabic singing into his trumpet-playing, including the microtonals and rhythmic complexities. To his credit, he often sticks very close to the traditional form, singing beautifully and full of deep-felt emotions, but these parts shift easily into intense interplay with the rest of the band, with long unisono lines, moving into improvizations which are either jazz or middle-eastern, yet perfectly comfortable with one another. Mahanthappa's sax-playing also fits perfectly with this music, as he is also a master in working on the tonal shades of his instrument. Great music, great band. Not to be missed!

The CD can be downloaded from iTunes.

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Dhafer Youssef & Wolfgang Muthspiel - Glow (Material, 2007) ***

Tunesian singer and oud player Dhafer Youssef has always been a musician to my heart, in the sense that he managed to create his own voice in contemporary music, in a creative and intelligent way. So far, Malak was in my eyes his best album, with Nguyen Le on guitar and Markus Stockhausen on trumpet. Here he is joined again by Wolfgang Muthspiel, as on "Electric Sufi". The whole CD is a little more introvert, and yes, Youssef's singing is still amazingly great and absolutely rare in its absolute power and range, but it's becoming a gimmick. His former albums, Digital Prophecy, was already less spectacular, but this one is even a little bland at moments. It's not bad at all, but it's not terrific either. There isn't enough musical expansion, his oud-playing is completely pushed to the background, and although Muthspiel is an excellent guitar player, the whole CD remains within a riskless zone, probably trying to appeal to more tastes. And that's never a good strategy.

Listen to
Mon Parfum
Babylon

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Middle-Eastern World Jazz

The Mediterranean has always been a melting pot of cultures and a crossroads of all great civilizations, with the exception of the native American culture. But now jazz gets thrown into the mix, and that has resulted in some worthwhile music, integrating the warm, emotional sounds and rhythms from Persian, Arabian and Ottoman music. There is more than plenty of kitsch to find as well, often westernized music for night-clubs and belly-dancing, or electronics for the current-day mass tourist dancing parties.

I give an overview of some albums and musicians I can recommend because the integration of styles is the result of genuine artistic endeavors with excellent results (and there is of course much more, and suggestions are also more than welcome).

Persian

Hafez Modirzadeh - People's Blues - Iranian sax-player who released a staggeringly good jazz CD with People's Blues, with strong influences of Persian classical music as regards scales and rhythmic patterns. The album is dedicated to the Kurdish victims of the first Gulf War. Very strong and deserves more attention. Tracks can be listened to on his site (it takes a while to open, so please be patient).

Arabian

Ahmed Abdul Malik - Jazz Sahara, Jazz Sounds Of Africa - One of the first musicians who started integrating North-African music and jazz in the early 60s (I know, I know, Ellington and others did this as well, and a little earlier, ...) Abdul Malik plays bass and oud. Listen to Isma'a.

Maurice El Medioni - Café Oran. El Medioni is a jewish Algerian who played piano in the nightclubs of Oran and Algiers in the 60s and 70s. His music brings an odd mix, but fun, and unreal in the authenticity of its entertainment value. Listen to Moel Medio.

Rabih Abou-Khalil - The Cactus Of Knowledge, The Sultan's Picnic, and many other CDs. Lebanese oud-player Rabih Abou-Khalil brings an uncredibly intense kind of jazz, often funny, or deeply emotional, with rhythmic changes which are hard to follow. Almost all his albums are of interest. Listen to Lamentation and watch the video clip below of "Ma Muse s'amuse".

Gilad Atzmon - Exile - Israeli musician with a very strong commitment to the cause of peace in the Middle-East, and he plays jazz with predominantly Arabian influences. Exile is his best album, with astonishingly good pieces (his last record "Musik" is not recommendable, bringing too many styles together in a pathetically pretentious album). Listen to Al Quds.

Anouar Brahem - Thimar - Tunisian oud-player Anouar Brahem is the absolute master of the refined composition, the precise arrangements and technical virtuosity. I prefer his CDs with only traditional instruments, but his more jazz-oriented releases with John Surman or Jan Garbarek are also highly recommended because of the sophistication and emotional depth. Listen to various sound samples.

Sami Moukaddem - The Crest Of A Wave. Young Irish-Lebanese guitar player. Brings a nice integration of jazz and Arabic music, with clear references to Rabih Abou-Khalil. Listen to March Of The Lemmings, although there are songs on the CD with a more personal approach.

Fayçal Salhi - Timgad - French-Algerian guitar and oud player, who makes a wonderful synthesis of cultures on Timgad. Listen to Entre Deux Mondes ("between two worlds").

Wajdi Cherif -Phrygian Istikhbar - Tunesian pianist who knows his jazz classics really well. Listen to Voyage.

The Belgian piano-player Nathalie Loriers also integrates Mediterranean influences in her music. Listen to L'Auberge Des Femmes. You can also read a review of her recent L'Arbre Pleure on this blog.

... and then two more fusion-oriented CDs:

Dhafer Youssef - Malak - Tunesian power-singer and oud-player, brings world fusion, with jazz instruments and at moments also very strong music. Despite his unique powerful voice, his singing is very precise and emotional. I find Malak his best record, with amongst others Markus Stockhausen and Nguyen Le. Listen to A Kind Of Love

Jonas Hellborg - Aram Of The Two Rivers - Swedish super bass player brings acoustic fusion of world jazz with Syrian musicians on violin, ney and percussion. Listen to Salah Al Din.

Turkish

Kudsi Erguner - Ottomania - Kudsi Erguner is one of the best ney-players in the world, and in the sufi tradition. He usually plays traditional music, but on Ottomania he is accompanied by some European and American top jazz musicians. Listen to Semai.

Okay Temiz - Istanbul da Eylül - Temiz is a master percussionist who played with many European jazz musians, but also with Don Cherry. Istanbul da Eylül is exceptionally good, with Sylvain Kassap and Lennart Aberg on saxes. But there is much more of interest to find in his discography.

Barana & Co - Live At The Music Meeting - Dutch-Turkish ensemble with amongst others Behsat Üvez on vocals, Ernst Reijseger on cello, Steven Kamperman on clarinet. Nice CD. Listen to Halai.

Alain Blesing - Yörük - Great album by this French guitar player with the Senem Diyici quartet.

And of course not to forget Don Cherry himself, with various recordings, including Live In Ankara, where he plays with a Turkish ensemble, transforming traditional Turkish music into his own kind of jazz.

Armanian

George Mgrdichian - One Man's Passion - Wonderful album by this Armenian oud-virtuoso, with an ensemble including Souren Baronian on sax. Listen to sound sample

David Yengibarjan - Pandoukht - Armenian accordionist who brings some great music here with Frank London on trumpet and Hungarian friends. This music goes already more into Eastern-European styles or balkan music. Listen to Ouverture

Watch a video clip by Rabih Abou-Khalil and band playing "Ma Muse s'Amuse" :

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Marcel Khalife - Taqsim (Nagam Records, 2007) ***½

Marcel Khalife is a Lebanese oud player and composer, who, for once, restrained himself to a trio album (as compard to his other symphonic and heavily orchestral and cinematic output), offering all the sensitivity and intimacy that characterizes good music. His oud-playing is excellent as is Peter Herbert, the Austrian modern jazz bass player, who acts as his main sideman on this album, ocne in a while accompanied by Bachar Khalife on percussion . The album consists of three long tracks, which delve into Arabian music, but also which also have more modern, jazzy connotations, meeting halfway between both genres, mainly because of the common characteristics of openness to improvization in both Arabic music and jazz. The strength of this music lies exactly in the interplay between the two lead musicians. The purpose of this album is to bring an musical expression and tribute to the poetry of the Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish, whoever that may be. Regardless, this is great music.

View Video below.

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IN A SENTIMENTAL MOOD : BELGIAN FEMALE PIANO PLAYERS

(for Nathalie)

The two best mainstream/world jazz CDs ever made by Belgian female pianists have much in common. And believe me, both albums are of world class level. They have a common approach in their search for absolute perfection in the combination of strong compositions with emotional power and instrumental virtuosity. Furthermore, both albums display an openness to the world which is characteristic and probably a prerequisite for obtaining these results. Myriam Alter is of judeo-spanish origin (sephardic) and was educated in an environment where Spanish, Italian, South-American and classical music were part of the daily environment. And Nathalie Loriers creates a band consisting of musicians of Italian, Yugoslavian-Jordanian, French-Algerian and Belgian origin. Belgium, the melting pot of the world ...

Myriam Alter - If (Enja Records, 2003) *****


This album offers an astonishginly sustained melodic beauty, elegance and precision of phrasing, rhythmic refinement, ... in sum, brilliant. This is mainstream jazz at its best : recognizable yet creative, emotional without being overpowering, intimistic with musical vision. One of the most surprising aspects of the album is that the classically trained pianist has replaced herself on her own album by another pianist, Kenny Werner. According to her, he is a better piano-player and she a better composer, and yet that doesn't really convince me, although the result is succesful in any case. The other musicians are also among the best : Dino Saluzzi on bandoneon, John Ruocco on clarinet, and the Masada rhythm section : Greg Cohen on bass and Joey Baron on drums. This ensemble brings the musical equivalent of a Belgian chocolate : high quality ingredients, it melts in the mouth, and it is very sweet but with a powerful, solid taste, the result of a crafty and virtuose process. And once you've eaten it, you just want more of it. Yet the most important difference here is that here it is the listener who completely melts inside, because of the heart-warming nature of the music. Sure, this album is miles away from free jazz, and I apologize for it, but I also have my sentimental side which appreciates top level mainstream jazz. And this album definitely fits into that category. Esthetic, refined, elegant, emotional, light, ...

Listen to sound samples

Waking Up
Home
IfI Think Of It
Moving Somewhere
Where You Belong

Nathalie Loriers Chemins Croisés - L'Arbre Pleure (De Werf, 2006) ****



Another Belgian album, "L'Arbre Pleure", that almost equals the quality of Myriam Alter's "If", comes from the Belgian piano-player Nathalie Loriers and her band Chemins Croisés ("crossroads"), with Gianluigi Trovesi on clarinet, Karim Baggili on oud, Philipppe Aerts on bass and Joël Allouche on drums. The line-up of the band and its name already indicate that many influences will be at work in the music : European, Arabian and American (jazz, you know). The comparison with Alter is a valid one, in the sense that the compositions are strong, the musicians (and then especially Trovesi and Loriers) excellent, with a very strong musical unity and emotional tension underpinning the whole album. The tone is not as melancholic as Myriam Alter's "If", and once in a while some joy seeps through, as in "A Pas Feutrés" (referring to her cat?) or "Mister Lee". The nice thing about this album is that the natural evidence of the melodies and the interplay hide the compositional and rhythmic complexities beneath, and indeed you should not notice these as a listener, you should just undergo it and enjoy it. And that's the only word I can think of for you : enjoy it. Excellent!

Listen to Sound Samples :

Kalila Et Dimna
L'Arbre Pleure
L'Auberge Des Femmes

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Ravish Momin's Trio Tarana - Miren (Clean Feed, 2007) ****

Percussionist Ravish Momin comes with a new Tarana Trio : Jason Kao Hwang has been replaced on violin by viool Sam Bardfeld, and Brandon Terzic replaces Shanir Ezra Blumenkranz on oud. This change gives the music a totally different color, despite the fact that the same instruments are used. Just like on "Climbing The Banyan Tree", the rhythms and rhythm changes are at the center of gravitation, but just a notch more intense than before. Momin's approach to music is hard to define, world music influences dominate, and then especially Indian rhythms and Middle-Eastern sound flavors, yet sometimes the melody lines are closer to European folk, but the real power of this music are the long improvizations which are definitely jazz-oriented. Bardfeld's violin sounds less abstract, less varied than what Hwang brought, but it's a little more hypnotic, basically because he's not afraid to bring repetitive themes, in which he approaches the same notes with a different intensity, and that doesn't miss its effect on the listener. The oud is also more prominent, because for Blumenkranz bass was his first instrument, and the oud was only used sporadically. And Terzic is good, even if it sounds at times ungrateful to play an instrument with limited natural volume against the hard driving drumkit, like in the title piece. The oud really shines when it can play solo, like at the intro of "What Reward" or when it's just accompanied by light percussion as on "Tehra" or "Fiza". This is a great CD, with strong emotional power and tension, and one that is easy to recommend to anyone interested in the combination of free jazz and world music.

Downloadable from http://www.emusic.com/

Listen to sound samples

Tehra
Fiza
Ragalia
Miren
What Reward?
Fiza

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Jason Lindner - Ab Aeterno - (Fresh Sound World Jazz) ***

Jason Lindner's first album, Ab Aeterno, offers a sparkling combination of jazz and world music, in a trio with Omer Avital on bass and oud, and Luisito Quintero on a large variety of small percussion. Lindner himself plays piano, and on some songs also melodica and mbira. The music is light as a feather, not unlike chamber music, with playful influences from the Middle-East, Africa and Latin America. But also Monk and Bud Powell join in. Monk and even Bach are identifiable together in the lightly classical "Song for Amos", Bud Powell in "Sure Thing/Glass Enclosure", a mix of two Powell compositions. On the rhythmically repetitive "Montserrate" the piano is replaced by the melodica, and the bass by the oud. Lindner is a fine pianist and composer, the melodies are harmonically and rhythmically well-crafted, yet it's all a little too composed for me, with not enough climaxes. And that might by due to Lindner's approach of the compositions : once he's got the core melody in his left hand, there aren't too many changes throughout the songs, creating an overall flat impression. On the other hand, the lightly dancing combination of piano, bass/oud, and hand percussion is so refreshing and the compositions so easily accessible, that they form the ideal music for this sunny Sunday morning.

Klik hier voor sound samples

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Tomchess & The Lovedogs - In The Beautiful Future (Foot Jumbo Records, 2007) ***

World jazz is often, like unfortunately very often in fusion music, an arrogant endeavour to connect different styles that do not really have anything in common. That is not the case on this CD by Tomchess & The Lovedogs (which can be ordered via CD Baby or downloaded trough iTunes), and which brings a mix of Arabian music, jazz (and ambient). Tom Chess plays ney, oud, reeds, guitar, djembe, and he has enriched his knowledge of these instruments in Africa and Asia. On this double album he is accompanied by Shane Shanahan and Ravi Padmanabha on percussion, Nathan Peck on bass and Alicia Rau on trumpet, all four strong musicians with a broad experience in both jazz and world music. The angle of attack for the album is world music, literally, because Tom Chess brings several of the pieces first solo on oud or ney, and the following song brings the same but with the whole band. And the musicians are good, something to be enjoyed in the long improvizations, and that is the best distinction between this band and many unsuccessful attempts by other bands. The overall feeling is one of world music, and even the street noises of voices that are thrown into the mix as background act functionally. This is pretenseless, respectful, nice world jazz, refreshing, tasty and lightly digestible like a bowl of fresh salad.

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Rabih Abou-Khalil - Songs For Sad Women (Enja, 2007) ****

For the first time in a long time Rabih Abou-Khalil goes back to the roots of his music, like what he already brought in his albums "Nafas" and "Roots & Sprouts". For those albums, Selim Kusur was the other main soloist, next to Abou-Khalil himself, on the Turkisch "nay". On this CD, this role is taken up by the Armenian Gevorg Dabaghyan who plays the "duduk", an instrument familiar to the oboe. Rabih Abou-Khalil's music is very recognizable, despite the variations in line-up he has had over the years, ranging from mini big band, over classical string ensemble to traditional world music. His rhythms are complex and change all the time, whereas his melodies with sometimes endless themes spiral en flow against these rhythmic changes, offering a pretty unique musical concept. It sounds complex, well though-through, but at the same time very natural. Furthermore, he leaves lots of space for improvization, in which he and all his carefully selected band members perform to the level of excellence. As an oud-player Abou-Khalil is totally different from Anouar Brahem or Dhafer Youssef. Brahem has a very soft touch, while Abou-Khalil has a more percussive approach (and you hear the sound of his guitar pick) and he goes much deeper emotionally when improvizing. I love the way in which he can sustain lower tones, then pauzing and leaving some space, then again playing some long sustained notes, building up the tension and in an almost minimalistic way creating emotional depths (or heights if you like). Dabaghyan's duduk is a totally different instrument from the ney, it has a more sentimental tone, even mellow at times, but that is luckily only apparent in the opening piece. Michel Godard is divine as usual, this time not on his tuba, but on the serpent, a medieval reed instrument producing bass tones as well, and in Godard's hands even an instrument for soloing. Percussionist Jarrod Cagwin is also a perfect fit for this kind of music, with a rich variaty of musical traditions in his bag. This is not jazz, not comparable to The Cactus Of Knowledge or Journey To The Center Of An Egg, yet it's the same musical adventure, full of variation, emotional, melodic and rhythmic power. In the face of all the mediocrity we are bombarded with, this album offers a refreshing piece of genuine art.

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