Hello,

Happy New Year!

We’re finishing our first album, finally. It’s a labor of love. Now it’s all about final mixes and the last minute tweaks. Before we uncover what the album is going to be about (in our upcoming posts), let us tell you about clashes and human conflicts that inspired us to write five songs for our first EP “Legacy”.

We’ve spent a good deal of time discussing a “theme” for each song, conflicts and stories we wanted to musically present. It’s an interesting, creative process that many times requires research and deeper understanding of the time and historical circumstances. Our rule is not to take side in any of the conflicts we describe, we just bring them together. It’s an invitation for dialogue, musical one.

An inspiration for the song “Hagia Sophia” came from the monumental architectural place - Hagia Sophia - Mother of Churches, a former patriarchal basilica, later a mosque, now a museum in Istanbul, Turkey. A place where Christians and Muslims worshiped and fought over, the “Hagia Sophia” is one of the greatest temples in the world. The song is embellished by elements of both Byzantine chanting and Middle Eastern instruments.

The song “Healing” is based on a traditional Andalusian lullaby, which in some cultures was sung to heal wounded souls. This rare process of reconciliation can be a much-needed path to conflict resolution. The flute melody constantly switches from a major to minor scale, back and forth.

“Legacy” juxtaposes samples of historic public speeches given by four former American presidents; Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, JFK and Ronald Reagan, two Democrats and two Republicans. We thought the words of US Presidents would have a bigger impact given the influence of these individuals on the world’s affairs. There is a larger question for all of us: “What is OUR Legacy?”, what kind of world we all leave behind us to our kids and generations after us. Below is our music video “Legacy”.

The main theme in “Metamorphosis” comes from Psalm 5 written by Ali Ufki, originally Wojciech Bobowski, a Polish protestant 17th century composer who later converted to Islam and who in his time represented a “musical bridge” between East and West. His musical works are considered among the most important in 17th-century Ottoman music. The voices of a Persian singer and a Turkish imam are representing a peaceful musical resolution to longstanding Shia-Sunni divisions in Islam.

The song “Hiroshima” is dedicated to the legacy of the first city in the world to suffer a nuclear attack that led to death of as many as 140,000 people. We have used samples of President Truman’s voice from his public speech given after the atomic bomb release and an archived recording of the traditional Japanese Imperial Palace Music Department recorded sometime during the Second World War.

Listen to these songs on our web site http://www.clashofcivilizationsmusic.com.

‘Till next time, all the best from Clash of Civilizations.

Tags: Clash of Civilizations, electronic music, mass culture, new world music, news, political electronica, world music

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 7th, 2009 at 8:47 am and is filed under Just Music. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.