My most intense dance experiences have been with live music. There are some truly amazing musicians out there, and there is nothing like dancing with live music!
A few of my favorites famous ones are:
-Omar Faruk Tekbilek (such a nice family guy, too! Love his wife!)
-Hossam Ramzy (Bellydance Big Daddy! He's got a great wife, Serena, too!)
-Joe Zeytoonian (met him at the Mendocino Camp; sincere heart!)
-Latif Bolat (taught me so much more than just music...the business side is what I learned from him!)
-Souhail Kasper (he's so unpredictable when he plays for dancers!)
-Ali Jihad Racy (a Master, what can I say...)
-Amir Sofi (great new drummer, and easy on the eyes, too! ;-) )
Anyone?
A few of my favorites famous ones are:
-Omar Faruk Tekbilek (such a nice family guy, too! Love his wife!)
-Hossam Ramzy (Bellydance Big Daddy! He's got a great wife, Serena, too!)
-Joe Zeytoonian (met him at the Mendocino Camp; sincere heart!)
-Latif Bolat (taught me so much more than just music...the business side is what I learned from him!)
-Souhail Kasper (he's so unpredictable when he plays for dancers!)
-Ali Jihad Racy (a Master, what can I say...)
-Amir Sofi (great new drummer, and easy on the eyes, too! ;-) )
Anyone?
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Indianapolis
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Fri, April 22, 2005 - 10:45 AMThe nicest, most humble and by the way the best drummer I have worked with is Faisal Zedan, here in LA. Very communicative, no delusions of grandeur, and the energy of a hummingbird that does not stop!
A very gifted but modest and giving drummer. He watches, and is fully involved with making it work well. -
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Fri, April 22, 2005 - 11:03 AMYes, that's so important, paying attention to each other! I've had experiences where the drummer forgot to do what we planned, but then didn't follow me, and well, it fell apart. We picked up the pieces and finished ok, but still, you gotta pay attention! On both sides.
:)) -
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Fri, April 22, 2005 - 11:48 AMYeah, I mean on our end we have to fully listen to what's happening, or it'll just be wrong. But many drummers feel that they don't have as much responsibilty to watch and respond to your movements. Faisal understands that all of his clean and dead-on technique will be just that, technique, unless he is there with the dancer.
It's such a beautiful thing, to create tarab, and it is so easy to do with him, we just click that way. -
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Fri, April 22, 2005 - 12:59 PMLucky lady!
What is his style, Egyptian, Lebanese, Turkish? -
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Fri, April 22, 2005 - 6:36 PMWell he's Syrian, so mostly he does Egyptian, but he is studied in and can play Turkish, and most other styles. I believe he studied with Ali Jihad Racy, when he started. I don't ask him about all that, though. He just came back from Turkey to study there, I haven't spoken to him yet about it.
He very much prefers old-style, but he knows the modern techniques, that he says most musicians do now.
He's played with the biggies, musicians and dancers. You can see him on the first Bellydance Superstars dvd playing with Tobias Roberson for Rachel Brice's drum solo. He doesn't get to do much(Rachel was with Tobias, still is??, so he is her main drummer).
He plays for Jillina at Wahib's. -
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Fri, April 22, 2005 - 9:23 PMWow, lucky lady!!!
Where do you dance at regularly in SF? -
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Sat, April 23, 2005 - 4:05 AMOh, I'm in LA, darlin'! :)
I did live in Berkeley for 8 months, I danced at Marrakech and Amira's. A few times at El Mansour.
I know I am very fortunate to know Faisal and get to work on stuff with him. But it's LA, there are so many very good people in the community here, and of course SF. By proximity I get to be around and absorb so much good stuff.
Where are you? I forgot, and I haven't looked at your profile in a while.
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Sat, April 23, 2005 - 5:29 AMWe are still in Turkey. We get back next week.
There is a bio for Faisal on THE site:
www.iqaat.com/yit-members.htm
There are a few sound clips there as well.
I'll have some new video clips of the various drummers we met while in turkey as well as some of Faisal up on the site in a month or so. I don't know if it is available to the public but he performed for Tammer Hena's disertation or something for UCLA. I heard it was wonderful.
The band he is the most connected with is the KAN ZAMAN classical arabic music ensemble in Los Angeles.
www.kanzaman.org/index.html
Together we founded Youm it Talaata percussion (and other stuff) ensemble. He also participates in a few other classical endevors.
UCLA is on special occasions now.
He will teaching at the Kosmos camp this year.
~Donavon -
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Sat, April 23, 2005 - 12:59 PMThanks for the in-depth Donavon! I could never keep it all straight.
I thought I saw a post of yours that said you had gotten back, lucky you, to be there!
I want to see pics! And hear weird and exotic stories! -
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Tue, April 26, 2005 - 12:26 AMBy the way, the video for Ozgur Kabuk on IQAAT's site is.....just fantastic.
Wow. -
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This is the maximum depth. Additional responses will not be threaded.
Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Tue, April 26, 2005 - 8:04 AMWow. You're right. I finally found the videos on his site, and checked them out. What a wealth of info!
Have you guys heard of Harem of Turkey? I'm sure you have, but I just discovered them recently; a Turkish friend of mine introduced me to them. The Ritm Kompozisyon is like nothing I've ever heard before.. -
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Tue, April 26, 2005 - 11:45 AMYup. We met with Saut Berkay who played on a few of the Harem CD's and got lots of video of him playing.
We also met with Mahmet Akatay. You should get a copy of the Akatay project if you can.
They turkish style of drumming is a combination of Indian and Persian.
I found tons of drum CD's in Turkey. Also because of the excitment over a few of the players, their friendlyness and professionalisim towards each other (at least what I saw) and the new drumming style over the past 5 - 10 years the darbouka is having a resergence there.
I will scan the covers of the CD's I got and post them on the site.
~Donavon -
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Tue, April 26, 2005 - 12:13 PMOH , yeah!!! Thanks, Donovan! No wonder I love the Turkish drumming...I can see the Persian influence and that makes sense, but why the Indian? Is it because of the Turkish Rom?
Also, what dancers have you noticed being popular right now over in Istanbul? I have heard of Alhena (sp?), and have a VCD of her, but that was from like 2001. -
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turkish.........
Tue, April 26, 2005 - 4:03 PMI think they are using Indian fingering (like on the tabla) to get the rolls really fast.
Didn't hear about any dancers at all. Tried asking but nobody could point me to any. We asked how the new style worked with dancers, and the musicians that I talked to said that they would have to revert to Arabic style in order to play for the dancers. Since the drumming style is so new I don't think there is a corresponding dance vocabulary yet.
The only dancer I heard mentioned was Asena. She is the dancer in Anjelica Akbar's music video: anjelikaakbar.com/data/video/orkide.wmv
I saw some dancers at the Orient House show. They were pretty good and I got some video. This was a very touristy show though.
~Donavon -
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Re: turkish.........
Tue, April 26, 2005 - 4:58 PMOH, well, that's who I meant, Asena. She's not to my taste, but I know a lot of people like her.
Hmmm...no dance vocabulary with the new drumming techniques? Sounds like a challenge! Tell me, which tracks on the first CD would be good examples of this "new" style of Turkish drumming?
Would love to see those videos; maybe you should post them on your site!
K xoxo
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Re: turkish.........
Tue, April 26, 2005 - 7:13 PMDonovan, please do tell any weird travel stories!
Something always seems to happen when you travel....that strange person on the bus that tells you their life story without you saying a word.... the bizarre late night adventures when you thought you were going here but for some reason you can't so you have to go there.....the cosmic interventions of sheer luck and narrow escapes from certain catastrophe.....etc....surely something weird had to have happened! -
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Re: turkish.........
Wed, April 27, 2005 - 8:19 AMOh, yes, I agree, Melania! I used to travel so much before I had my daughter. I miss it! My Mom was a jazz singer, so she dragged (drug?) me around to all her gigs since I was like old enough to travel (1 yr?). And they wondered why I became a bellydancer! Guess that's why I love Turkish music so much; it's similar to jazz.
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Sat, August 27, 2005 - 11:30 AMHey Katya,
I refound this thread. If you haven't seen them already, I have posted a few video clips of the band Harem that you mentioned in your post.
iqaat.com/v-web/gallery/album05
~D -
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Sun, August 28, 2005 - 3:36 PMCool, Thanks, D.!
Hey, I want to use some of their music for a concert I'm doing in April, and I want to make a DVD...will copyright stuff be difficult?
Thanks!
K xoxo -
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Mon, August 29, 2005 - 1:00 PMDon't know about copyright. Turkey is trying to become part of the EU so I don't know what changes they may have made to any applicable laws.
You could try emailing their publisher in Turkey.
www.megamuzik.com
If you are trying to make it all official and stuff, I could give you the email of a one of the drummers we met that has worked with them.
~D -
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Mon, August 29, 2005 - 2:54 PMCool, thanks D. I'll look into it!
K xoxo
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Wed, October 5, 2005 - 8:50 PMUm Kalthum takes my breath away and it goes on a rollercoaster ride of emotion and passion and then comes back to me!
Sarah
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Fri, June 30, 2006 - 9:59 AMHas Youm it Talaata released a CD? I heard Faisal at Kosmos camp and would love to hear more of his work. -
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Thu, July 6, 2006 - 10:01 PMNope, no CD.
Youm it Talaata is just the name that is used for various different combinations of musicians that myself or Faisal have played with.
There are some videos with Faisal on the Mike Ouds site. I tried to get the links for you but the videos are in RealPlayer and it keeps crashing my machine..
www.mikeouds.com/video/
Faisal is also playing the Kan Zaman concert in Los Angeles on July 22nd.
Cheers,
~D
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Tue, January 17, 2006 - 6:05 PMHi Katya,
Your favorites are mine as well.
Hossam Ramzy is my favorite drummer of all. Technique, heart/soul, everything about his playing is phenomenal.
I love Souhail Kaspar too, incredible tone, tasteful, so much class in his playing. I saw a lecture years ago at U.G.A. with him and Ali Jihad Racy, fantastic!
I also really like Hamza el Din, I saw him in concert and met him afterwards. He's very nice, very deep soul.
Burhan Ocal, the Turkish wonder, saw him too, mind-blowing!
Another who I really like is Ali Hafid, the late Moroccan drummer who played with the Feenjon Group back in the 60's.
I also love the group Radio Tarifa, they're a big influence.
There's way too many more to list, I'd be up all night typing!
-Eric -
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Wed, January 18, 2006 - 10:55 AM"Feenjon Group back in the 60's. "
Oh, my, I had forgotten about them!! Wow...
Yeah, I'm from the George Abdo generation :) My first teacher always used to dance to his stuff, and use it for class, too. Now I realize how lucky I am!!!! -
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Wed, January 18, 2006 - 11:52 AMI used to see George Abdo back in '75 when I was a kid.
My mom used to dance a bit, and she was friends with George as well as some of the band members.
I was a wonderful thing to experience that live music and dance as a child. I still love to listen to George Abdo's records.
-Eric -
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Wed, January 18, 2006 - 12:03 PMYeah, I read your article awhile back!! I really liked it :) -
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Re: Who's your favorite ME musician and why?
Sat, January 21, 2006 - 12:41 PMThanks so much, I'm glad you enjoyed it!
It made me happy to write it, I felt honored.
-Eric
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