Formations

For almost forty years and with a rich discography now covering no less than 11 albums on the ECM label, Anouar Brahem has been constantly placing the age-old tradition of Arab music, whose emblem is his oud and its superb finesse, in different situations, where he not only contrasts it to modern jazz but also to the sophisticated harmonies of the erudite compositional tradition of the West and the refined forms of other ancient cultural traditions from the Orient.

Today, he can draw on the experience he has gathered over the years in his concerts with other musicians. Here he has decided to commit with the Quartet created in 2009 for the album The Astounding Eyes of Rita, to a project returning to his former terrain for the first time ever through a repertoire combining several of the group’s usual themes, together with some taken from older albums (Conte de l'Incroyable Amour, Madar, Thimar, Astrakan Café, …).

As leader of this group, more lively and creative than ever after ten years of close understanding between himself and his musicians, Anouar Brahem is now casting a fresh look at his musical universe and opening up some original horizons for it.

In recent years Anouar Brahem has carried his ideas on marrying the formal sophistication of Western chamber music and the richness of the age-old Arab musical tradition a long way. But now, with Blue Maqams, he is taking up his fascination for jazz once again. Here, we might say he picks up again where he left off twenty years ago with the album Thimar. This time round, he planned another small group with some highly talented jazzmen for his new recording to be made in New York in spring, 2017. In fact, this was to be a delightful reunion including Dave Holland again, plus the jubilation and harmonic sophistication of Django Bates on piano and the subtle rhythms of legendary drummer Jack DeJohnette. Based on original compositions combining superb melodic refinement with a deliberately simple formal organization to allow space and total freedom for the powerful creative talent of whoever is improvising, Anouar Brahem develops a lyrical universe here that is both utterly coherent in aesthetic terms, whilst offering a wide range of varying moods. Showing his total commitment to rhythm as well as expression, he works simultaneously on finely woven blends of timbre, the delicate balance of the dynamics between instruments and the ever-richer passages constant interaction between these great improvisers gives rise to.

In April 2018, a few months after the official release date of the album, the quartet undertook a tour across Europe where they appeared in several large, prestigious concert halls such as the Philharmonie de Paris, the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg and the Philharmonie in Munich. 

Probably Anouar Brahem has never gone so far into the balance between formal elegance and freedom of expression, lyricism and restraint, sensuality and asceticism, as he does here with this new repertoire which seems to ideally synthesize almost fifteen years of his personal and aesthetic quest for an authentic “common understanding” between Orient and Occident. Leading a brand-new Quartet, Brahem here revisits every facet of a musical universe that is at once melancholy and introspective in integrating his sensibilities and instrumental language—undeniably anchored in the Arab tradition—with the Impressionist, evanescent piano of colourist François Couturier, the pulsing sensuality of Björn Meyer's electric bass, and the misty, dreamlike, Nordic romanticism from the bass clarinet of Klaus Gesing.

As if to further emphasize the hybrid nature of his universe, here Brahem plunges his quartet for the first time into the sound-fabric of arrangements that are both sumptuous and minimalist, orchestrating a string-ensemble where the soloists (beginning with the melodic enchantments of the oud) are presented in an organic, voluptuous setting which is particularly stimulating. With ever more refinement in its melodic lines and at once contemplative and subtly narrative in its developments, the music contained in Souvenance possesses those qualities of self-evidence, naturalness and simplicity which are the hallmarks of works of genuine inspiration.

A delightful new project assembled by Tunisian oud master Anouar Brahem.
The combination of the bass clarinet with the oud suggests a link to Anouar’s “Thimar” trio, but this East/West line-up often feels closer to the more traditionally-inclined sounds of “Barzakh” or “Conte de l’Incroyable Amour”. Klaus Gesing, from Norma Winstone’s Trio, and Björn Meyer, from Nik Bärtsch’s Ronin, are both players with an affinity for musical sources beyond jazz, and they interact persuasively inside Brahem’s music.

A dance of dark, warm sounds, urged onward by the darbouka and frame drum of Lebanese percussionist Khaled Yassine. The album is dedicated to the memory of Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish.

"Pleyel, December 2009 (…) The concert by the Tunisian musician Anouar Brahem has just ended to a standing ovation rarely heard in this legendary venue (…) Three encores, and a hall on its feet, delirious with such rare, very rare happiness."
Hugues Blondet, La pensée de Midi -  Actes Sud

"(From our special correspondent in Paris)… On the main stage at Pleyel (…) the music of the Tunisian virtuoso heated the silence of a tenacious, almost groovy Oriental vein (…) 2000 spectators breathing sighs of pleasure… At Pleyel, Brahem scored a triumph."
Philippe Cornet - Le Vif,  L'Express

"Onstage, the music, delicate and finely chiselled, loses none of its fragility and leaves space for silence." 
Patrick Labesse, Le Monde