Transposition is the title of a musical challenge cross-pollinated by each Palestinian and Western classical music. Abdul-Wahab Kayyali, at the moment based mostly in Montréal, is an oud virtuoso. He’s teamed up with GRAMMY-nominated cellist Naseem AlAtrash to carry out his unique music.
The microtonal music of Arabic maqam and Western harmonies mix in an East-West fusion that composer Abdul-Wahab Kayyali calls neoclassical; the oud and the cello make harmonious collaborators, because it seems.
The Transposition mini-tour will deliver them to Ottawa on June 4, Toronto on June 5, and Montréal on June 6.
Abdul-Wahab Kayyali
Abdul-Wahab Kayyali initially studied the oud on the Nationwide Music Conservatory of Amman, Jordan. He additionally studied with Iraqi oud virtuoso Munir Bashir. As a soloist, he has carried out all through North and South America, in Europe and the Center East. In 2020,he shaped the worldwide music trio Les Arrivants in Montreal, and launched a debut solo album title Juthoor the identical 12 months.
Naseem Alatrash
GRAMMY-nominated Palestinian cellist and composer Naseem Alatrash relies in Boston. He has carried out at venues such because the Kennedy Heart, Lincoln Heart, and the Monterey Jazz Pageant in a profession identified for bending and mixing genres.
Alatrash’s music blends jazz with Arabic music and up to date influences, classical coaching with improvisation. Together with a busy solo profession, he performs with the Turtle Island Quartet, Terence Blanchard, and Amir ElSaffar’s Rivers of Sound. He’s an assistant professor of Cello at Berklee School of Music, and directs ensembles at Tufts College and Longy College of Music.
Abdul-Wahab Kayyali performs Ajam Improvisation, from “Les Arrivants” live performance at Carleton School, April 20 2024:
Abdul-Wahab Kayyali: The Interview
How did he come to compose music for the duo of oud and cello? It’s not essentially an apparent mixture.
“I studied the oud on the Nationwide conservatory of music at Jordan within the 90s,” Kayyali explains. He started by giving about equal time to finding out each the cello and the oud. The latter received out when it got here time to select.
“However I really like the instrument, and it has a particular place in my coronary heart,” he says of the cello.
Kayyali lived within the US for a time, the place he met and related with cellist Naseem Alatrash. The 2 had mentioned performing collectively, and had plans to start in 2020 when the world of reside music got here to a crashing halt with the COVID pandemic.
“I saved holding on to the concept that at some point, we’d have the ability to play collectively,” says Abdul-Wahab.
On his eventual arrival in Canada, Kayyali wasn’t working as a full-time musician at first. When he made that swap, it put him right into a place to use for funding to develop music for the oud and cello.
The Music
“This system mainly consists of my compositions for essentially the most half,” he explains. Many of the materials was written over the previous few years. “Two have been composed particularly for this challenge.”
The outcomes have been initially recorded with one other cellist based mostly in Montréal, with a reside efficiency that passed off in Ottawa in 2023. “Since then, Nassim and I’ve been in dialogue attempting to get this to occur.” The small print lastly got here collectively final fall. “We’ve been engaged on it ever since.”
Regardless of their longstanding mutual pursuits, the Canadian mini-tour might be their first. “This would be the first time that we play collectively.”
Abdul-Wahab Kayyali and cellist Sheila Hannigan carry out Kayyali’s Transposition: Duo for Oud and Cello:
Is it the Cello?
There are just a few different notable collaborations between cellists like Naseem Alatrash, French cellist Vincent Ségal, and different instrumentalists that enterprise past the same old Western orchestration. Is it one thing concerning the cello…?
“I believe actually, when you’ve got musicians which might be open — the very first thing you must do, and I attempt to do that as properly, is get out of your consolation zone,” Kayyali says. It’s about coming collectively to get used to performing in methods exterior the same old. “[It’s] utilizing their ability set in a inventive method.”
He factors out that Alatrash’s background can also be Palestinian, in order that despite the fact that he’s chosen to focus on a Western instrument, the microtonal music is already in him and his creativeness.
“This music doesn’t sound overseas to him,” Abdul-Wahab says. “However I do suppose that the cello, possibly due to the register, is extra forgiving of points to do with intonation and tonality.”
A violin, he factors out, could be extra susceptible to problematic intonation. “I believe the cello is a good complement to Arabic music.” The bottom C is similar on each the cello and oud. “For our two devices, they match very a lot in register.”
Their variations and contrasts create curiosity, comparable to bowed vs. plucked method, and the rhythmic potentialities of the oud. “I really feel like that distinction can also be complementary.”
If an increasing number of musicians are utilizing the cello exterior the realm of Western classical music, it might simply be that they’re catching as much as its adaptable nature. Surprisingly, there are few technical points between the cello and oud.
“We tune the identical, as lengthy we tune to a specific reference — 440 or 442,” he explains. “We’ve sheet music, and it’s fairly detailed.” Naturally, that features variations to the ornamentation and phrasing, together with different parts.
Creating Up to date Palestinian Music
“I give it some thought as neoclassical, as a result of it’s classically knowledgeable,” says Kayyali. That features each Western and Arabic classical music. “It’s a product of its time,” he provides, “or, I’d describe it as up to date microtonal music. The cello is ready to play microtones.”
He treats each devices as soloists, with passages the place they play collectively. “I attempted to seek out the best combination and the best sounds.” The aim is to create complementary sounds. “It’s like having a dialogue. I can begin a phrase, and the cello completes it. It actually has to face on each legs.”
Alongside the way in which, he hopes to showcase each devices in novel methods. “It’s actually attempting to current these devices in ways in which they haven’t been offered.”
Ultimate Ideas
Naturally, in 2025, as a Palestinian, it’s not possible to flee present occasions. Nevertheless, he doesn’t need the music to be skilled, or live performance attended, solely due to his nationality.
“I need the artwork to face by itself two toes no matter its id.”
Two of the compositions in this system have been written particularly to revolve across the problems with Palestinian id. “One was earlier than October 7,” he says. The opposite was written just some days after, after what he describes as a sequence of sleepless nights.
“I simply needed to empty all of it on the sheet music in entrance of me,” he says. “It’s a really tough time for our neighborhood.”
Music and id, ultimately, are inseparable, at the same time as he’d just like the music to be judged by itself deserves. “That is our method of creating our humanity,” he says. “I do need folks to offer the music an opportunity,” he provides.
“Actually, the music isn’t sure by geography. For me, that is the promise of music, of artwork, is to problem this concept that people will be separated by something.”
Even in terms of purely aesthetic considerations, purity is one other method of expressing exclusion — and sterility.
“Combination normally produces higher outcomes,” he says. “Purity is an evil assemble.”
Whereas his main instrument is the oud, one with a historical past that stretches again 1000’s of years, he makes use of it in a up to date mode.
“I’m not considering of it as a relic of the previous.”
- Discover extra particulars and tickets for the Ottawa live performance on June 4 [HERE], the June 5 live performance in Toronto [HERE], June 6 in Montréal [HERE]
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Anya Wassenberg is the Toronto Metropolis Editor at Ludwig Van. Beforehand, she was a contract author with a specialty in tradition and journey for 3 a long time, and a inventive writing teacher for Ontariolearn.
