After the Last Sky Anouar Brahem, Anja Lechner, Django Bates, Dave Holland

• 1 Remembering Hind 01:52
• 2 After the Last Sky 05:42
• 3 Endless Wandering 08:11
• 4 The Eternal Olive Tree 04:00
• 5 Awake 08:49
• 6 In the Shade of Your Eyes 04:27
• 7 Dancing Under the Meteorites 04:25
• 8 The Sweet Oranges of Jaffa 07:13
• 9 Never Forget 07:49
• 10 Edward Said’s Reverie 02:58
• 11 Vague 03:13
• Total Runtime 58:39

Info for After the Last Sky

Eight years after Blue Maqams, Anouar Brahem returns with a new project, and a programme of powerfully-moving pieces for oud, cello, piano and bass.

Asked about the nature of his artistic journey, Brahem has drawn analogies with the growth of a tree, its branches spreading out above ground, while roots dig ever deeper. Over time and the course of a remarkable discography beginning with Barzakh, his music has become steadily more inclusive. While evoking the modes of Arab music as a primary resource, he has consistently sought in his work to engage with the wider world, finding inspiration in many idioms, including jazz improvisation, European classical music and contemporary composition, and shaping a highly personal music that could only have been created by him.

“Today, the sonic materials that seem particularly transformable and stimulating to me are those that combine tradition and modernity,” said Brahem recently. “For example, the Arabic maqams, which are at the heart of my musical identity, fascinate me with their melodic richness and their ability to integrate into contemporary musical contexts. They offer an infinite terrain for experimentation. I find it exciting to juxtapose these ancient modal structures with harmonic approaches from jazz, creating a dialogue between past and present, between cultures and styles.”

On After The Last Sky bassist Dave Holland and pianist Django Bates are again part of the Tunisian oud master’s international quartet, joined now by cellist Anja Lechner. Brahem’s rapport with Holland – first established on the Thimar album of 1998 – is meanwhile legendary. “Dave’s playing gives me wings,” Anouar has said, an observation verified on the striking duo improvisation “The Eternal Olive Tree”. Throughout the album, in fact, from the exploratory edges of “Endless Wandering”, a piece that vibrates with emotion, to the driving propulsion of “Dancing Under the Meteorites”, Holland’s soulful bass impulses prompt some of Anouar’s most outstanding playing. There is also a particular pleasure in hearing the combined sonorities of oud and bass and cello, warmly embraced in the responsive acoustics of the Lugano studio (where Brahem recorded Souvenance a decade ago). The ensemble sound is exceptional.

The album marks the first time that Anouar has featured a cellist in his group music. Anja Lechner, who has the uncommon distinction of being a classical musician with much experience in improvisation, is effectively a leading voice in the recording. She has long been conversant with Anouar’s compositions and included some of them in her own recitals, and in work with Brahem-associated pianist François Couturier (see for instance the album Lontano). The cello is given the first and last statements on After The Last Sky. The album begins with “Remembering Hind” – played here by Lechner and Bates – music of mourning for a young victim of war. It ends with “Vague”, one of Anouar’s best-loved pieces (a composition he has recorded on Khomsa and Le Voyage de Sahar), its gentle buoyancy in this rendition like the lapping waters of the eastern Mediterranean.

As with Blue Maqams, Django Bates’ piano has an important, patiently-supportive role throughout. Bates, whose work elsewhere (see for instance The Study of Touch), may often prioritize swing and quick-witted dynamic contrasts, understands that an ongoing sense of flow is crucial to the development of Anouar’s music. Its effect is cumulative. Yet it also offers space for individual statements, and Django’s swirling and elegant solo on “Awake”, is the more potent for the restraint shown hitherto.

Where should we go after the last frontiers?/Where should the birds fly after the last sky? – These lines of verse by Mahmoud Darwish provided a title, 40 years ago, for After The Last Sky, Edward Said’s meditation on exile and memory. In his liner notes, Adam Shatz considers Anouar Brahem’s music in the contexts of this aesthetic-literary continuum as well as the ongoing struggle for Palestinian rights, a subject preoccupying Brahem’s mind during the preparation of material for the album. In this regard, track titles become pointers for the interested listener to consider. But, as Anouar also tells Shatz: “Music, and particularly instrumental music, is by nature an abstract language that does not convey explicit ideas. It is aimed more at emotions, sensations, and how it’s perceived varies from one person to another. What may evoke sadness for one person may arose nostalgia for another… I invite listeners to project their own emotions, memories or imaginations, without trying to ‘direct’ them.”

After the Last Sky was recorded at Lugano’s Auditorio Stelio Molo RSI in May 2024, and produced by Manfred Eicher.

Anouar Brahem, oud
Anja Lechner, violoncello
Django Bates, piano
Dave Holland, double bass

Anouar Brahem
was born in 20 th October 1957 in Halfaouine in the Medina of Tunis. Encouraged by his father, an engraver and printer, but also a music lover, Brahem began his studies of the oud, the lute of Arab world, at the age of 10 at the Tunis National Conservatory of Music, where his principal teacher was the oud master Ali Sriti. An exeptional student, by the age of 15 Brahem was playing regularly with local orchestras. At 18 he decided to devote himself entirely to music. For four consecutive years Ali Sriti received him at home every day and continued to transmit to him the modes, subtleties and secrets of Arab classical music through the traditional master / disciple relationship.

Little by little Brahem began to broaden his field of listening to include other musical expressions, from around the Mediterranean and from Iran and India... then jazz began to command his attention. 'I enjoyed the change of environment,' he says' and discovered the close links that exist between all these musics'.

Brahem increasingly distanced himself from an environment largely dominated by entertainment music. He wanted more than to perform at weddings or to join one of the many existing ensembles which he considered anachronistic and where the oud was usually no more than an accompanying instrument for singers. A deepfelt conviction led him to give first place to this preferred instrument of Arab music and to offer the Tunisian public instrumental and oud solo concerts. He began writing his own compositions and gave a series of solo concerts in various cultural venues. He also issued a self-produced cassette, on which he was accompanied by percussionist Lassaad Hosni.

A loyal public of connoisseurs gradually rallied around him and the Tunisian press gave enthusiastic support. Reviewing one of Brahem's first performances, critic Hatem Touil wrote: 'this talented young player has succeed not only in overwhelming the audience but also in giving non -vocal music in Tunisia its claim to nobolity while at the same time restoring the fortunes of the lute. Indeed, has a lutist produced such pure sounds or concretised with such power and conviction, the universality of musical experience'

In 1981, the urge to seek new experiences became ever stronger and his departure for Paris, that most cosmopolitan of cities, enabled him to meet musicians from very different genres. He remained for four years, composing extensively, notably for Tunisian cinema and theatre. He collaborated with Maurice Béjart for his ballet 'Thalassa Mare Nostrum' and with Gabriel Yared as lutist for Costa Gavras’ film 'Hanna K.'.

In 1985 he returned to Tunis and an invitation to perform at the Carthage festival provided him with the opportunity of bringing together, for 'Liqua 85' , outstanding figures of Tunisian and Turkish music and French jazz. These included Abdelwaheb Berbech, the Erköse brothers, François Jeanneau, Jean-Paul Celea, François Couturier and others. The success of the project earned Brahem Tunisia's Grand National Prize for Music.

In 1987, he was appointed director of the Musical Ensemble of the City of Tunis (EMVT). Instead of keeping the large existing orchestra, he broke it up into formations of a variable size, giving it new orientations: one year in the direction of new creations and the next more towards traditional music. The main productions were 'Leïlatou Tayer' (1988) and 'El Hizam El Dhahbi' (1989) in line with his early instrumental works and following the main axis of his research. In these compositions, he remained essentially within the traditional modal space, although he transformed its references and upset its heirarchy. Following a natural disposition towards osmosis, which has absorbed the Mediterranean, African and Far-Eastern heritages, he also touched from time to time upon other musical expressions: European music, jazz and other forms.

With 'Rabeb' (1989) and 'Andalousiat' (1990), Anouar Brahem returned to classical Arab music. Despite the rich heritage transmitted by Ali Sriti and the fact that this music constitued the core of his training, he had in fact, never performed it in public. With this 'return' he wished to contribute to the urgent rehabilitation of this music. He put together a small ensemble, a 'takht', the original form of the traditional orchestra, where each instrumentalist plays as both a soloist and as an improviser. Brahem believes this is the only means of restoring the spirit, the subtlety of the variations and the intimacy of this chamber music. He called upon the best Tunisian musicians, such as Béchir Selmi and Taoufik Zghonda, and undertook thorough research work on ancient manuiscripts with strict care paid to transparency, nuances and details. For more information visit: http://www.anouarbrahem.com

Booklet for After the Last Sky