Jadayel, with Ahmad Al Khatib & Youssef Hbeisch (Palestine)

… A moment of pleasure …

On the one side Orient, neither ethereal nor nostalgic. A bristling, vivacious shore today, fed by an ancestral tradition  constantly reinvented.

The elegant and gifted Ahmad al Khatib, performer and composer, draws an embroidered music with ūd, punctuated by the complicity of Youssef Hbeisch’s percussion – riq, bendir, darboukas… A whole subtle world, age-old and contemporary, feverish, nervous, poetic, where this obstinacy of rhythm, these ornaments, loops, and rotations would lead us into a trance…

On the other side, an energetic, nonconformist string quartet, as familiar with the finest repertoire (Crumb, Ligeti, Scelsi…) as with unusual encounters beyond expected borders (Albert Marcoeur, Anne Bitran, Fantazio, Moriba Koïta…). Four  musicians who question their time in its diversity and from every angle.

The Festival de Chaillol builds a bridge between these two shores.

The challenge: sharing timbres, practices, and searching for points of contact between both cultural areas. Or how can Arab heterophony be submitted to a western harmonic treatment? How can the classical quartet rediscover its modal memory?

The etymology of Al Khatib’s name touches the written and the spoken (katib ‘the writer’, khatib ‘the preacher’). It coincides precisely with this audacious and risky wager. Because can one be sure the encounter will be fruitful? Both parties are fond of adventure(s) and used to listening to the Other. This taste, this desire, already ensure a moment of pleasure.

Catherine Peillon

June 2012, for the Festival de Chaillol

 

Music

Ahmad AL KHATIB & Frédéric AURIER

With

Le Quatuor Béla

Julien Dieudegard & Frédéric Aurier, violons
Julian Boutin, alto
Luc Dedreuil, violoncelle

Le Duo Sabîl
Youssef Hbeisch, percussions
Ahmad Al Khatib, oud

QBela_Image_Disque jadayel

Création

Juin 2012,
Festival de Chaillol

Production

Festival de Chaillol
Supported by DRAC Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur
CD supported by Qattan foundation.

Tour with La clique production

Sélected for Babel Med 2013

Médias

Vidéos
Revue de presse
Aboute Duo Sabîl

Music
Radio : l’Écoute des Mondes (RTS)

Dates