Tarek Yamani

Tarek Yamani, The Afro-Tarab Pairings Project for solo piano

The “Afro-Tarab Pairings Project” is a piano solo performance where each tarab / Arabic-influenced piece is paired with an Afro-American / jazz-influenced piece. The concept was born after a striking similarity was unwittingly noticed between the pieces of Tarek’s solo repertoire – consisting of rearrangements of songs from the classical Arabic, Samba, Afro-Cuban and jazz songbooks – making their connection become ever more evident once each piece was paired with its soul mate from a land far away. Coincidentally, after the pieces were paired based on their musical spirit, it turned out that they also matched either by titles, themes or poetic inclinations. This remains a mystery.

Some of the paired pieces include:

Brazilian Chico Buarque’s “Com Acucar Com Afeto” x
Egyptian Darwich Al Hariri’s “Muwashah Hubbi Zurni”

Billy Strayhorn’s “Lush Life” x
Alexandrian Sayed Darwich’s “Lahn Al Shayalan”

Harry Warren’s “You’re My Everything” x
Lebanese Ziad Rahbani’s “Bala Wala Chi”

Dizzy Gillespie’s “A Night In Tunisia” x
Egyptian Kamel Al Khulai’s “Fi Hulal Al Afrah”

www.tarekyamani.com