Monday May 27 * 8pm * $15 * TICKETS

Multiflora Productions presents Nadah El Shazly in duo with Luke Stewart

"Nadah el Shazly is part of a burgeoning underground music scene in Egypt that has been rightly garnering more and more interest of late. Having started out in music in a Cairo punk band singing Misfits covers, El Shazly gradually moved into homemade electronic music before alighting on the mystical hybrid between rock, avant-garde music and electronica that forms the core of Ahwar (“marshlands” in Arabic). With Libyan guitarist Sam Shalabi and fellow Cairo native Maurice Louca (both members of The Dwarfs Of East Agouza with Alan Bishop) adding their prodigious talents to the fray, El Shazly has joined together past and present to position herself at the forefront of the new North African music scene.

Her voice is singularly seductive throughout, even on the album’s wilder moments (more on those later). On the lengthy, mostly acoustic ‘Barzakh (Limen)’, she mutters broodingly over chugging acoustic guitar chords as flutes, fiddles and muted percussion create a stark, intensely morose atmosphere in the background. El Shazly’s diction is precise as she lingers over the lyrics, slowly releasing them in unhurried flows. A stark electronic passage takes over from the acoustic instruments midway through the track and her voice soars into the upper register, heavy with emotion. Comparisons have been made with singers like Annette Peacock or Björk but these fall way off the mark as El Shazly’s singing is distinctly Egyptian in style, her beautiful voice contorting in ways few western singers are able to....

Ahwar is a perfect amalgamation of traditional Egyptian song with experimental takes on performance and instrumentation. And Nadah el Shazly’s is a voice, as both singer and songwriter, that will haunt your dreams for days after listening to this album."

- Joseph Burnett, The Quietus

LUKE STEWART (DC) has emerged as one of the most exciting young bassists on the improvised music scene on the east coast. Based in Washington, DC, he plays regularly in New York, Baltimore, and Philadelphia, and has toured in Europe. He has gained considerable exposure playing with the James Brandon Lewis Trio and he also leads or co-leads his own projects including Ancestral Duo with Jamal Moore and Heart of the Ghost with Ian McColm and Jarrett Gilgore. As a solo artist, he has composed a series of improvisational structures for upright bass and amplifier, utilizing the resonant qualities of the instrument to explore new sounds. He has also been integral to the literary jazz group Heroes Are Gang Leaders.

Bushmeat
Dr. Thomas Stanley’s electroBush, improvised electronic sound art and words designed to emancipate the listener from archaic and destructive tendencies and beliefs.
https://eatbushmeat.bandcamp.com/