Mike's Oud Forums

NYC folks

Brian Prunka - 5-6-2012 at 10:11 AM

If anyone is interested in NY I have a couple of things coming up:

Tonight (Sunday) I'm playing traditional music and songs with Sami Abu Shumays and Rami El-Aasser at a new Jordanian/Mediterranean restaurant in Cobble Hill. 8:30-10:30, Olive Vine, 316 Court St in Cobble Hill Brooklyn.

Monday the 14th, I'm playing original Arabic/Jazz music at Sycamore in Ditmas Park with my band Nashaz.
1118 Cortelyou Rd, Brooklyn

Maybe I'll see some of you fine NYers . . .

cheers,
Brian

ibn sina - 5-15-2012 at 07:07 AM

Hi Brian,

Thanks for a great show last night.

Any chance of posting the playlist?

best,
Kiki

Brian Prunka - 5-17-2012 at 08:02 AM

Hi, Kiki!

Thanks again for coming out, it's always good to see people from the forums in the real world . . .

The setlist was:

Seven Nahawand
Hijaz Nashaz
Jurjinah
City of Sand
Murassah
Doulab Suzidil
‘Ajam

They are all my compositions. I recorded the show and there is some video as well . . . I have to see what I have and try to post some things.

mavrothis - 5-17-2012 at 08:39 AM

I'm sorry I couldn't make it. It would be great to hear some of the performance if it was recorded.

Thanks,

Mavrothi

ibn sina - 5-22-2012 at 06:35 AM

Thanks!
Kiki

Brian Prunka - 5-23-2012 at 04:22 PM

Okay. here's a taste . . . my friend Sohrab shot these, they came out okay.

Doulab Suzidil

City of Sand

Jurjinah

Jody Stecher - 5-23-2012 at 04:35 PM

Wow, that's beautiful. Things have sure changed from the early days of middle eastern/jazz. Most of it wasn't even music, let alone good music. Same thing has been happening "under the radar" in small clubs with Indo Jazz music here in San Francisco. Such comings together used to be bad jazz-ish music with oriental sound effects. This is good musicianship, good tone, good rhythm, good composition.

Brian Prunka - 5-23-2012 at 08:22 PM

Thanks for the compliments, Jody. I'm glad you liked it.

I think this is a pretty exciting time for Middle-eastern jazz and other jazz hybrids. We have a couple of generations for whom the experiments of Coltrane, Ahmed Abdul-Malik, Sun Ra, Pharaoh Sanders, Tony Scott, Don Ellis, John McLaughlin, et al were a starting point for pursuing a more in-depth and serious study of this music.

At the same time, the internet has made it much easier to communicate with people all over the world, to learn about and hear music that would have been nearly impossible to find in the West even 15 years ago. We're at a point where an open-minded and inquisitive music lover will almost inevitably be exposed to great music from most of the world's great musical traditions. People often ask why I started playing the oud or how I came to be interested in Arabic music, and I don't really know what to say. We live in a multicultural world. In many ways, I feel like I didn't 'find' Arabic music or 'choose' to study the oud; I feel more like it found me--there is this inevitability about it.

All of which is to say, there are a lot more people these days who have similar experiences, whether like Amir ElSaffar growing up in the US playing jazz trumpet before rediscovering his roots in the Iraqi maqam, or Tareq Abboushi growing up in Ramallah and coming to the US to study jazz piano. People who, for one reason or another, feel a deep connection to both jazz and Arabic music and are trying to find common ground between them in ways that are organic and authentic to their personal human experience while respectful to the depth of the respective traditions.

Jody Stecher - 5-23-2012 at 08:39 PM

That's it exactly. What you and others are doing feels natural and unforced. And the references to the past are deep and confident.
Quote: Originally posted by Brian Prunka  
Thanks for the compliments, Jody. I'm glad you liked it.

People who, for one reason or another, feel a deep connection to both jazz and Arabic music and are trying to find common ground between them in ways that are organic and authentic to their personal human experience while respectful to the depth of the respective traditions.

Brian Prunka - 6-18-2012 at 01:02 PM

Hey folks, sorry for the late notice, but I'll be playing again tonight at Sycamore with my band Nashaz. Hope to see some of you there!

There's also a band of French-Turkish musicians playing before us at 8:30, should be cool.

Nashaz
Sycamore Bar and Flower Shop
1118 Cortelyou Road Brooklyn, NY 11218. T 347-240-5850
(near the Q train)

We go on at 9:30, no cover but suggestion is $10 or whatever you can afford.

cheers,
Brian

Giorgioud - 6-19-2012 at 02:34 AM

Great music, Brian. I especially loved the solo in "Jurjinah". And a great outfit too, a cool performance. Thanks for posting the vids. Interesting debate also, about the cross-pollination of cultures. Always a great thing (the pollination, I mean). I wish I got started being exposed to Eastern music (not necessarily Arabic) from more up-market sources, but those I got later after backtracking why The Beatles' and The Byrds' most beautiful and intriguing songs always seemed to involve some Eastern scales somehow.......

Brian Prunka - 6-19-2012 at 05:03 AM

Thanks, Giorgioud!