Your background is Armenian and you were born in Kamachli, Syria, and studied art in Armenia. How do your Armenian and Arab heritages influence your art?

Especially now that I am so far from both Syria and Armenia, I find myself all the more influenced by the landscapes and aesthetic cultures of my origins.  I find direct inspiration in the art of the Armenian miniature and in the Arabic calligraphic arts.  I think that my sense of color is also linked to my heritage—the vivid colors of the Armenian miniatures, but also the ochre and more muted hues of the Syrian landscape.

And without being overtly so, my art has become more political with time, (since even just being of Middle Eastern culture in the United States has become politicized in the last decade.)  I grew up writing both from right to left and from left to right, and I feel that symbolizes the way I have been able to see the world from different perspectives, which I try to express in my art.  If you look deeply, my art is often speaking of tolerance and intolerance, the need to look to the past, the desecration of nature, and the injustices of this modern society.

You perform live onstage with musicians, painting as they play. How did this art form originate?
I call my performances with musicians—in which I create art, mostly live, which is projected on a screen—live visuals.  I started doing this with a friend in Armenia 15 years ago, and it has developed since then.  The idea came out of the style of painting that I developed for myself in which I paint using a tube of paint to create lines, which I smear into the forms that my inspiration and the paper dictate.  In California, where I first lived when I came to the United States, I was dubbed, “The Fastest Draw in the West”, because no one had seen images created so quickly.  It’s a personal technique that is well-suited to the form of art as a live performance.

In the past, we’ve seen you work on the Gilgamesh Project with Syrian composer and musician Kinan Azmeh. How did that idea come into being? What was it like working with Azmeh?
I love collaborating with Kinan.  We have similar values, ideas and spontaneity, and it’s always very exciting to work together.   The Gilgamesh project came to us as our response to the Iraq war.  We wanted to show the wealth of the culture that was being destroyed, a culture that boasts the oldest epic committed to writing.  Gilgamesh is a beautiful, riveting, complicated story, and it was the perfect subject for us to work on together.

And the Silk Road Project—how did that come about? What was your experience like with Yo-Yo Ma?
The Silk Road Project was created by the famous cellist, Yo-Yo Ma, to connect different cultures through art.  Fascinated by the history of the Silk Road, Yo-Yo Ma and his collaborators pulled together a number of talented musicians and artists from countries all along the Silk Road to compose new works and re-interpret old ones using unorthodox but thought-provoking and beautiful combinations of instruments.  Yo-Yo Ma is extraordinarily generous as an artist and as a human being, and it is the biggest honor to be able to work with him.

How are you finding life in New York? Any exciting performances coming up?
I live in New York and just finished my first theatrical collaboration with my wife, an actress and singer, at the renowned New York International Fringe Festival.  In November I will be working with Rami and Bachar Khalife, the incredible pianist and percussionist, at the Festival du Monde Arabe de Montréal.  I will also soon be working with the incredible Colin and Eric Jacobsen, (violinist and cellist with the Silk Road Ensemble, the Knights, and Brooklyn Rider,) and the dancer Maile Okamura of the Mark Morris Company, on a project we will perform at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.  I have other projects under way, but it’s too early to talk about them…

Finally, how do you continue reinventing yourself? What reinvigorates you?
I re-invent myself by testing the limits of what I can do.  The play I just did was an example of that—working with a live actor, with my art as a character…  Most importantly, I will purposely destroy what comes out most easily, and I will periodically take short breaks from painting (to concentrate on performing, for example,) in order to examine my own work from a different angle, to figure out if it’s satisfying my own needs as an artist.

http://www.kevorkmourad.com/KM/Home.html

How did you start your musical journey?

A long time ago, finding a guitar at a friend’s home in Damascus. Although music was always around us, the challenge of figuring out how to make that instrument sing was too tempting to ignore.

And where did you study?

I began my music studies in my late teens, after we had moved to the States from Syria. At first it was on my own, and then I enrolled in university in Massachusetts. But my first really influential teacher was the late Charlie Banacos, a genius in the truest sense of the word. I studied jazz improvisation with him. In later years I began a long and lasting relationship with Arabic music, but that story might be too long for right now!

You have composed for films and documentaries including The Encounter Point, Amreeka, and Budrus, as well as a Beyonce & Shakira Duet—very eclectic! Can you tell us a little about each?

I like to say that I’m “musically bi-lingual”—trained in Western music, but steeped in Arabic, and specifically Near Eastern, styles. All of these projects demanded some sense of that. Encounter Point called for a very traditional score, so there were elements of classical Arabic music and Klezmer. Amreeka was a story with a lot of heart, so the score had to be subtle and sweet. I used the Arabic accordion as one of the primary colors. The work for Shakira required slick string arrangements, the likes of which you’d hear in the music of the latest Arab pop singers….

The most challenging of all, however, was the score for a PBS documentary called The Mosque in Morgantown, in which I had to combine elements of Arabic, North Indian and West Virginia bluegrass! I’m very excited to report that my score has been nominated for a 2010 News & Documentary Emmy.

What’s in store for you in the immediate future? Any concerts, collaborations or new films or other projects coming up”?

I am at the very tail end of completing a large-scale choral commission, about an hour long, for a choir with soloists, trumpets, harps, 2 percussionists and an organ. The text is from Khalil Gibran’s book, Jesus: The Son of Man, and it will premiere in Boston on May 8 with repeat performances on May 18 2011. I think we’ll have a 90-piece choir, so I’m very excited about this project. Gibran’s text is very powerful, and there is a very strong Boston connection, as this is where he and his family moved when they emigrated from Lebanon.

Read more about Kareem Roustom at http://www.kr-music.com

For Ayoub, the youngest of seven siblings, singing was a way to carve out a private sphere, wherever she may have been. Born in Lebanon, she and her family fled the country at the outset of the civil war and began a new life in Venezuela.

Spanish quickly joined Arabic as a second mother tongue. School brought English and French, with a level of fluency that sees her dream in all four.

Still, certain languages seem more suited to different purposes, says the quadrilingual singer.

“I feel that Spanish and Arabic lend themselves to more dramatic interpretation than English or even French.

“When I sing in Spanish, I transport myself to the streets of South America and the smells and images of the land I grew up in, to the stories of the people, to Spain and its Moorish influence. And then it’s as if I make a shift when I sing in Arabic…. I’m connecting to a past I haven’t reconciled with, my homeland. For me, it’s filled with much sadness and yearning, but also with great love.”

Her music defies categorization.  With instrumentation that blends classical Spanish guitar and sounds from the oud, and vocals that unite lilting, Eastern-inspired phrasing with Alison Krauss-worthy country riffs, it is almost uniquely rounded.

She draws on the musical traditions of all her cultures, from composers Gabriel Yared and Ennio Morricone to Fairuz, Ziad Rahbani, Sabah and Juan-Luis Guerra—all artists, “who don’t do it for the fame or money, but because they truly love the art of creating sound.”

But the message at the heart of her songs is certainly universal—love.

“It’s the one thing everyone craves,” she says. “Love of one’s homeland, love for life, love for the one who breaks your heart and the one that lights it up again.”

Find out more about Elizabeth Ayoub at elizabethayoub.com

The festival is hosted under the organization of Masahat Contemporary Dance Network, which has dancers from Lebanon, Syria, Jordan and Palestine among its members. During the festival, the featured dance companies will travel Palestine, making appearances in the cities of Jerusalem, Ramallah, Bethlehem and Hebron.

As part of the festival, educational workshops for dancers will be taking place. The City Dance Ensemble will host a one-month education program in collaboration with the Palestinian Ministry of Culture and Sareyyet Ramallah. The workshops are meant to educate local dance groups, choreographers, and dance trainers in Ramallah Jerusalem, Bethlehem, and Nablus.

In addition to those workshops, the famous Italian dance company, Botega, will be hosting five workshops on various genres of dance. The end result of the later five workshops will be a joint performance of Botega and The Sareyyet Ramallah Troupe for Music and Dance, taking place in Italy in the month of June.

The Ramallah Contemporary Dance Festival will also be acknowledging the  World Dance Day on April 29^th, which will be celebrated with a special evening of performances. There will be two shows dedicated for the youngest followers of dance. The City Dance Ensemble will be doing the popular “Jungle Books” and Siljeholm/Christophersen will be performing “Adventurous Adventure.

In addition to all this, 2010 also happens to be a very special year for the festival and there are two reasons why this is so. Firstly, 2010 marks the 80^th anniversary of the establishment of Sareyyet Ramallah, which is a Palestinian NGO, contributing to the building and development of the Palestinian society through work with Palestinian children. Secondly, the festival will also be celebrating the work of German choreographer PINA BAUSCH, who died last year. The role she played in the development of modern dance in Germany, and all across the world, can not be underestimated, and the festival will commemorate her memory with screenings of films and documentaries about her through-out the festival.

Written by Lucy Natek

The name of the band is probably a cleverly coined expression for “two ouds”, or at least thats what this writer assumes. The latter is an acoustic instruments of North Africa and the Middle East, and is coincidentally also the instrument the two musicians use as a base for their music creations.

It can be said, that Mehdi and Smadj are in fact bringing the oud playing to a whole new level, with their freshly, and very 21^st century take on it.  They are not shy with mixing it, and it seems they will go for just about anything in this faze of the creative process, which makes their music unique and fresh, and also variating in style and form.

Mehdi is in this case, the virtuoso on the oude, while Smadj shows his brilliance with sound engineering, making the DuOud sound a mashup of North African native sounds and Western technology. They are hardly pioneers in this sense, because the lute combined with electronic beats, well this has all be done, many many times. However, in the case of DuOud, bringing together all these different music elements, never feels forced, as the different instruments and melodies blend together in the most natural manner, with the outcome result being simply astonishing to one’s ears, leaving the listener in the state of awe.

DuOud music is so good, because the two musicians compliment each other superbly, and have the courage to brake away from the standard bonds, this type of music often puts on itself. Something in this music simply flies over the standard form of a native instrument playing over an often cheap house beat.

I am not surprised to read about people falling in to actual trances, when hearing the two parisians play live. It is for sure the type of music, you need to listen to in a venue, with proper sound, that will allow you to indulge yourself in all the geniusly combined elements and layers of it.

Written by Lucy Natek