Madar

Sull Lull
Madar
Sebika
Bahia
Ramy
Jaw
Joron
Qaws
Epilogue 

"[...] It is as though the music that they are creating together is, in a way, an underground river which resurges all of the sudden, the incarnation of musical impulses coming from ancient generations, and the unconscious is thus conserved. Only now, it is a new audible after the instrumental technique and the sincerity of the musicians becomes so developed that it launches a memory of common things long ago forgotten. Jan Garbarek picks-up melodies which for him are foreign and transforms them as a sleepwalker walking barefoot on the burning coals of Arab and Indian music. And Anouar Brahem inserts himself in the long phrases of Garbarek’s saxophone. It is so calm and supreme that it seems that the Tunisian man, stretched-out on his divan, has gone much further than most musicians of jazz affairs in their quest of new music."
Frankfurter Allgemeine Magazin
Wolfgang Sander

"[...] Here you have three musicians who improvise and transgress all the traditions which they have been issued, always guarding a conscience of their origins as something fundamental. The result is an exchange by three among continents, a particular celebration whose reason is the great mutual respect and intelligent and sensitive concertation. Of cultures which disconcert and master us."
Die Weltwoche
Peter Rüedi

"[...] A world of sound which fascinates and side-tracks. Hypnotizing music which, from the begining to the end, from solo to duo to trio, bewitches us and raises us above the fray [...] In MADAR, the foreign cultures do not only flirt with each other, they meet, communicate and melt together."
Stereo
Manfred Schmidt

"[...] Jan Garbarek has created an absolutely original aesthetic of quietude. Anouar Brahem masters just as well the excellent art of the pause, the art of saying a lot with very little sound [...] Inspired improvisations, of great music, important, timeless and placeless."
Stereoplay
Matthias Inhoffen

"[...] One of Garbarek’s most interesting albums to date [...] Brahem on oud, and Hussain’s tabla drums provide Garbarek with some stimulating interaction [...] Sull Jull and Joron have bite and depth."
The wire
Stuart Nicholson

"[...] Garbarek, Brahem et Hussain proposent neuf motifs à méditation transcendantale [...] Grand moment de sérénité subtile [...] Il doit être possible de vivre en compagnie de ce seul disque."
Le Monde
F. Marmande

"[...] Modale, terriblement modale ; lyrique, terriblement lyrique ; virtuose et aérienne, terriblement : la rencontre de Garbarek, Brahem et Hussain porte le numéro 1515 au catalogue ECM. L’Histoire a de ces détours..."
Le Monde de la Musique
Alex Dutilh

"[...] Garbarek, Brahem et Hussain tissent ensemble un tapis de sons intimistes où le silence a sa place, où les fils se dénouent, se distendent puis se rejoignent de nouveau. Ces trois là savent s’écouter et se répondre avant de s’assembler. Nulle profusion dans leur musique, mais un grand dépouillement. Le sax ténor ou soprano de Garbarek emprunte à l’Orient son lyrisme. Le oud de Brahem se teinte de syncopes jazzy ou de vélocité flamenque. Les sonorités métalliques du tabla de Hussain complètent magnifiquement la douceur veloutée du oud et du sax. Leur swing léger vogue de sautillantes ballades en méditatives promenades [...]"
Télérama
Eliane Azoulay

"Jan Garbarek délivre des bolées d’air pur dans MADAR. Depuis longtemps, il a les oreilles tournées vers les étoiles, les déserts, les steppes... et le jazz. Il épanche ici la clarté de son saxo chantant. Jeu d’ombre et de lumière, subtilement décliné avec le virtuose tunisien du oud, Anouar Brahem, et le vétéran pakistanais des tablas, Shaukat Hussain. Ils distillent une douceur d’aube, des notes roses et bleues, des rythmes d’ocre aux senteurs de sable, des rêves de ragas... Et un lyrisme saisissant."
L'humanité

Choc of the year, "Le Monde la Musique" (France)
CD of the month, "Stereoplay" (Germany)
The best shots of the year, "Stereoplay" (Germany)

Recalling one of the trio’s early performances, writer Wolfgang Sandner highlighted an intriguing detail: the Tunisian oud virtuoso Anouar Brahem is as much of an outsider to traditional Arab music, as it is usually performed in his country, as Norwegian saxophonist Jan Garbarek is to the mainstream jazz tradition. Both Brahem and Garbarek are highly independent by nature: musical foreigners to one another who here meet on equal ground, joined on certain tracks by the master Pakistani tabla player Ustad Shaukat Hussain, whose contribution lends this music its often pulsing and captivating heartbeat.

Garbarek had been intrigued by Brahem’s first album, Barzakh, released on ECM, and wished to work with him. A first trial recording was quickly organized, and an immediate connection was established between the two musicians.

Anouar Brahem is indeed a modern musician, yet his way of playing remains deeply rooted in a profound knowledge of authentic Arab music – as opposed to the more conservative, folklorized version often reserved for tourists. In his native Tunis, having completed his studies at the National Conservatory, Brahem took daily lessons for four years with Ali Sriti, the oud master. He then decided to systematically expand his knowledge by immersing himself in other musical traditions, exploring Mediterranean repertoires, Iranian music, the music of the Indian subcontinent… and eventually jazz. Brahem felt a “deep bond” uniting these forms, and was determined to explore them further. While living in Paris in the early 1980s, he discovered Keith Jarrett through the album Facing You, and was thrilled by the pianist’s improvisations, where he detected “Andalusian accents”.

Further discographic explorations turned Brahem into an aficionado of the entire ECM catalogue. Thus, when he recorded Barzakh in 1990, he already knew the label’s history and musicians intimately. Among them was Jan Garbarek, whom Brahem regarded as one of the foremost references in improvisation.

Garbarek’s own “transcultural” tendencies seem to date back to his – purely coincidental – choice of John Coltrane as a model, and his association in the mid-1960s with Don Cherry, a musician constantly in search of traces of a universal musical heritage. Since then, Garbarek has embarked on dozens of ventures into other musical idioms, performing with guitarist Egberto Gismonti, Indian violinist Shankar, Greek composer and pianist Eleni Karaindrou, and Pakistani singer Ustad Fateh Ali Khan, while at the same time acknowledging the exotic qualities inherent in Norwegian folk music, which has become one of his areas of predilection. Commenting on influences perceived in Norwegian folk songs – which, to him, have “a Middle Eastern, Turkish or Arab sound” – Garbarek remarked:
“What fascinates me is precisely this link that unites Norwegian and Indian music, spanning the Balkans and Asia Minor…”

It is therefore easy to conclude that Garbarek and Brahem both set out, each in his own way, on similar quests, even managing to bring the music of their respective homelands to a worldwide audience. Both believe that a folk tradition which never changes or adapts is doomed to disappear. That is why neither showed any reluctance to open their own cultural expressions to the challenge of new forms. Thus, Sull Lull, a traditional Norwegian melody, was probably sublimated for the very first time here, through the contribution of Arab oud timbres and North Indian tabla sonorities, which seem perfectly suited. Of course, such encounters rely entirely on the sensitivity of the participants. Garbarek, for his part, prefers to see his role not as that of a scholar-ethnomusicologist equipped with a saxophone, but simply as a musician:
“These inter-cultural encounters – call them what you will – always begin, for me, with the establishment of a relationship with a specific musician. If bonds of friendship and sincere understanding develop between us, then there is every chance that we will make music together.”

Seventy-four-year-old Shaukat Hussain had already distinguished himself as a most sympathetic accompanist on Ragas and Sagas (ECM 1442); his presence on Madar provided the natural continuation between these two highly intimate projects, even though the emotional current that runs through this latest recording is quite different. Ustad Shaukat Hussain also contributes a most charming solo on one of his own compositions, “Jaw”.

A review in the American magazine Option of Conte de l’Incroyable Amour, Anouar Brahem’s album (ECM 1457), noted that “Brahem’s artistic presence was so dazzling that he could perfectly well share the spotlight, or even relinquish it entirely at times, and still remain the central focus of musical interest. The subtlety and nuance of his playing, as well as its underlying dramatic form, deserve close attention.”

The album Madar contains not the slightest trace of competition between musicians. The assurance of Brahem’s contributions, the grace of his phrasing, the flawless brilliance of each solo encouraging warm responses from Garbarek’s saxophone – particularly the tenor – and the breathtaking improvisations all around… In a word, Madar offers majestic performances by each of its participants, perfectly attuned to one another.