Amir ElSaffar Returns to The Soraya With His Rivers of Sound Orchestra

Revered Iraqi-American trumpeter, santur player, vocalist, and composer Amir ElSaffar fuses elements of traditional Middle Eastern modal music and American jazz to create a mesmerizing sonic hybrid that moves into a free state of uninhibited musical exploration. He returns to The Soraya on Saturday, April 23 with his diverse and virtuosic 17-piece pan-Arabic Rivers of Sound Orchestra which features Middle Eastern masters as well as U.S. jazz stars, including guitarist Miles Okazaki, drummer Nasheet Waits, and woodwind legend J. D. Parran.

The Chicago Tribune said "ElSaffar's melismatic trumpet lines conveyed tremendous lyric beauty, his phrases bending and twisting in ways that Western ears are not accustomed to hearing...among the most promising figures in jazz today" (Chicago Tribune)

To open the evening, award-winning, American-born Indian classical vocalist Aditya Prakash brings the Aditya Prakash Ensemble to The Soraya for the first time.

Tickets for Amir ElSaffar's Rivers of Sound Orchestra with the Aditya Prakash Ensemble are available starting at $36 at www.thesoraya.org and by calling 818-677-3000. The Soraya is located at 18111 Nordhoff Street, Northridge, CA 91330.

About Amir ElSaffar's Rivers of Sound Orchestra
This performance marks Amir ElSaffar's third appearance at The Soraya, the first with his Rivers of Sound Orchestra. The ensemble is composed of 17 musicians from a broad spectrum of musical worlds. Together, the group creates a novel sound that transcends established notions of style and convention.

Composer, trumpeter, santur player, and vocalist Amir ElSaffar has been described as "uniquely poised to reconcile jazz and Arabic music," (the Wire) and "one of the most promising figures in jazz today" (Chicago Tribune). A recipient of the Doris Duke Performing Artist Award and a 2018 US Artist Fellow, ElSaffar is an expert trumpeter with a classical background, conversant not only in the language of contemporary jazz, but has created techniques to play microtones and ornaments idiomatic to Arabic music that are not typically heard on the trumpet. Additionally, he is a purveyor of the centuries old, now endangered, Iraqi maqam tradition, which he performs actively as a vocalist and santur player.

As a composer, ElSaffar has used the subtle microtones found in Iraqi maqam music to create an innovative approach to harmony and melody, and has received commissions to compose for large and small jazz ensembles, traditional Middle Eastern ensembles, chamber orchestras, string quartets, and contemporary music ensembles, as well as dance troupes.

ElSaffar began the Rivers of Sound Orchestra in 2015, and released the double LP, "Not Two," on New Amsterdam Records in 2017. Rivers of Sound has performed in festivals, concert halls, and opera houses worldwide. The musicians represent a variety of traditions, playing Middle Eastern, Indian and Western instruments such as oud, buzuq, santur, joza, cello, saxophone, oboe, mrudangam, frame drum, drum set, and re-tuned piano, vibraphone, and guitar. During the rehearsal and performance process, individual cultures melt away and a feeling of camaraderie emerges. Through improvisation, the group forms a non-hierarchical social microcosm based on compassion and connection in the collective pursuit of beauty.performed in festivals, concert halls, and opera houses worldwide.

Using resonance as its governing principle, Rivers of Sound incorporates elements of microtonal maqam modal music of the Middle East with jazz and other contemporary musical practices to create a unique musical environment that moves beyond the notions of style and tradition into a realm of uninhibited musical communication.

The highest ideal in maqam music is to reach a state of tarab, or "musical ecstasy," which results from the melting away of borders between a notion of self and other, as performers and audience revel together in the music. As pitches and rhythms become fluid, so do cultural boundaries: elements that traditionally divide musicians and genre-specific modes are re-contextualized in a fresh transcultural soundscape.

For more information, please visit AmirElSaffar.com.

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