A mind-blowing concert presented by the world renowned French-Lebanese musician Abaji was held at La Galerie,
Alliance Française de Dhaka on Friday.
The legendary musician played compositions on different types of traditional instruments of Middle Eastern, European,
East Asian and Indian origin.This was his second show in Dhaka. Last November, Abaji first performed in Dhaka as part of an international conference on the Arab Spring jointly organised by Alliance Française de Dhaka and Chittagong in partnership with Dhaka University.
Amid huge applauses by the audience, Abaji entered the stage and started the show by playing ‘For a Cloud’ on a luthier, a bamboo clarinet specially designed for Abaji from southern France.
This was followed by ‘Anatolia’ on a bouzouki, a Greek traditional stringed instrument. Other pieces played on the bouzouki were ‘Black Sea Blues’ and a Turkish song called ‘Tchodjouk Guitté’.
The composition ‘Red Sand’ was played on a small saz called ‘çura’ which is a type of Turkish mandolin. After that, he played ‘Improvisation 1’ on the çura and ‘Steppes’ on the laz kemencheh, which is a three stringed Turkish and Greek violin.
After a brief intermission, Abaji resumed the concert playing ‘Improvisation 2’ on the laz kemencheh and ‘Immensity’ with an Indian flute and a frame drum. He beautifully sang a song titled ‘Min Jouwwa’ in Arabic, meaning ‘From the Inside’. The compositions ‘Faraché’ and ‘Improvisation 3’ were played on a special guitar transformed into an oriental lute. Afterwards, ‘Origin Orients’ was played on a Colombian bamboo saxophone.
He also played ‘Summertime2’ on the Hulusi, a Chinese instrument from the Yun Nan in south China. During the concert Abaji used rattles on his ankles and stomped on a bass stomp box.
-With New Age input
