MUSIC, A HEALING MEDIUM ON SO MANY DIFFERENT LEVELS
By Kaelen Wilson-Goldie
The Daily Star
Thursday, September 14, 2006
Musicians come to the rescue of war victims with benefit concert and CD
INTERVIEW
BEIRUT: "We felt that we were trapped," says Ghazi Abdel Baki, as he
sits in the colorful seventh-floor headquarters of his production
house for documentaries, animations and music. The noontime sun is
filtering through fabric panels that loop down from the glass ceiling
of a rooftop office. The labyrinthine spaces of Forward Productions,
situated in the neighborhood of Sakiat al-Janzir, between Verdun
and Raouche, include recording studios and editing suites and rooms
stuffed with low-slung couches and pillows.
Abdel Baki, who is 36 going on 37 this month, is a drummer by training
and a composer and producer by trade. At present, he is recalling
the initial motivation that sparked "We Live … ," a compilation by
Lebanese musicians created under the summer’s siege.
"We didn’t know where the horizon of this war was," he explains,
meaning that while Israel was bombing Lebanon during the months of
July and August, no one knew when it would end.
"If we had known where the horizon was, we might have lived this period
differently," adds Carol Mansour, Abdel Baki’s partner at Forward and
a documentary filmmaker with boundless energy and an impressive head
of auburn curls.
"Moving around the city was very difficult," explains Abdel Baki. "And
the feeling was very difficult. In the beginning, we felt all our
projects had been halted in their tracks. It was very abrupt. There
was no build-up to this. We were not prepared for a war.
We had to shift from being productive people very quickly."
Less than a week into the conflict, Abdel Baki and a handful of
musicians he has known and worked with for years decided to meet up at
the Blue Note Cafe on Makhoul Street, between Hamra and the American
University of Beirut, one of the longest-standing and most-fabled
music venues in Beirut.
Among them was Charbel Rouhana, one of Lebanon’s best known oud
players, who performs regularly at the Blue Note; bassist Abboud
Saadi, whom Abdel Baki describes as "the godfather of all the modern
musicians;" and Ziyad Sahhab, an up-and-coming oud player, singer and
composer, who, at 23, is set to release his second album on Forward
next month.
"The Blue Note is like our second home," explains Abdel Baki. "And
it was one of the few places that was open at the time. We stayed
from noon until seven in the evening, just discussing things."
A friend from Kuwait, Meshal al-Kandari, was also with them. A
marketing manager for mobile phones who writes poetry and, as it
turns out, song lyrics – he got stuck in Lebanon when the war broke
out. Beirut was meant to be a stopover on his way to the rather more
rollicking Spanish island of Ibiza.
At the end of that first and ultimately only Blue Note session, Abdel
Baki, Kandari and company left with a plan. Kandari would orchestrate
a benefit concert for Lebanon in Kuwait with Rouhana and a band of
musicians who would join them there from locations as far flung as
Armenia (Arthur Satyan) and Minnesota (Tom Hornig).
Abdel Baki would take tracks by all the musicians present and rework
them – in some cases re-record them – into the compilation that is
now complete, a copy sitting in its jewel case on a desk in Forward’s
office.
"Whatever needs to be done on the outside needs to be linked to people
on the inside," says Abdel Baki, addressing a contentious issue that
has afflicted those working in all spheres of culture in Lebanon –
whether to create for an audience at home (showing solidarity) or
abroad (raising awareness).
Abdel Baki and Kandari embraced the debate and did both. For six
days in July, Abdel Baki worked on the CD. It wasn’t easy. After
that meeting at the Blue Note, many of the musicians holed up in
their respective hometowns. The proximity of the Forward studios
to the Israeli warships located off the coast of Beirut made for
particularly harrowing and disruptive acoustics.
"We had no electricity. Our morale was down. Here, you hear very well
the gunboats and in this glass structure," he explains, one feels
palpably exposed to the threat of death.
Still, Abdel Baki, Rouhana, Saadi, Sahhab and Kandari managed to rework
and update the six tracks that now comprise "We Live … " Kandari
added new lyrics to Rouhana’s "Loubnan Fawk Hamat al-Duniah." Saadi
rejiggered a previously unrecorded, jazzy instrumental piece called
"Najwa’s Song." Sahhab captured the mood of the time with a tracked
named "Safar," the expression used when someone has traveled. Abdel
Baki messed around with a track slated for his upcoming album
"Communique #2," a follow-up to his debut, "Communique #1." The song
now carries the title "Under Siege."
"Before the title was much more cynical," he says.
What was it?
"Happy Citizen," he smiles.
What is immediately striking about "We Live …" is that, considering
the circumstances under which it was produced, it is a far from
somber album. While not particularly cohesive in terms of style or
even quality – a compromise to context – it is resolutely energetic
and suitably manic.
"Beyond the bombing and all that is, in our opinion, being imposed
on us, we felt that we as musicians, we live," says Abdel Baki. "Out
of total chaos musicians can still produce. That was the challenge,
and some people criticized us for this but the fact that we were
producing an album is itself [the point]."
As evidence of how technology kept people tethered together during
the war, Abdel Baki finished the album, "liquefied" the tracks by
converting them into MP3 files, enlisted a graphic designer in New
York to do the layout of the cover and the liner notes and then sent
everything to Kuwait, where Kandari, who had grabbed Rouhana and fled
Lebanon to make it on time to that benefit gig, set up a group called
Wafa ("loyalty" in Arabic) to produce the CD there.
Now, all proceeds from both the benefit concert and sales of the
CD are going directly to humanitarian aid and refugee relief groups
working on the ground and with the people in Lebanon. That in itself
posed an additional round of challenges.
Over the past month, much criticism has been leveled at the Lebanese
government’s Higher Relief Council (HRC) for inefficiency, ineptitude
and worse in terms of distributing aid.
Particularly in its documentary division, Forward carries a distinctly
progressive political bent – producing films about migrant labor in
Lebanon, for example. So Abdel Baki is well positioned to say he thinks
such criticism about the HRC is valid: "It’s totally politicized
and arbitrary," he says. For this reason, the contributions from
"We Live …" are going directly to the people. "No bureaucracy,
no red tape," Abdel Baki says. To keep this system transparent,
Kandari has created a blog to track the movement of funds.
The first edition of "We Live …" consists of 2,000 copies, and
Abdel Baki hopes to follow it up with a series of concerts
at Masrah al-Madina this fall. This is only a slight modification of
his original plans for the season.
"We’re two weeks behind, but October is still October," he says,
stepping toward a door with a schedule of appearances taped to
it. "This is from before the war," he says, running a finger down
the list. "This haunted us. This was a reminder to us every day." It
seems to have worked.
"We Live … " is available at CD-Theque, the Virgin Megastore
and online. For more information, please see or
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
