Beirut: Traces of a City – A Pod Poem by Rana Eid and Nadim Mishlawi

Beirut: Traces of a City – A Pod Poem

Podcast

Episode 6 of the TIMEZONES podcast series, co-initiated and co-produced by Norient and the Goethe-Institut. This episode reflects on the current uncertainties experienced in Beirut and how they have influenced creative processes.

The city of Beirut is a space that is constantly transforming. From the violent conflicts of the recent past to the social uncertainty of the present, Beirut has become synonymous with precariousness.

A podcast by Rana Eid and Nadim Mishlawi

Co-initiated and co-produced by Norient and the Goethe-Institut

Featuring: Chaza Charafeddine, Muriel N. Kahwagi, Sharif Sehnaoui, Rana Eid

Artistic Editor: Abhishek Matur
Project Management: Hannes Liechti
Jingle Voiceover: Nana Akosua Hanson
Jingle Mix: Daniel Jakob
Mastering: Adi Flück, Centraldubs
Artwork: Šejma Fere

→ Full transcript of episode 6

Listen On

→ Listen to further TIMEZONES episodes

Featured Artists

Chaza Charafeddine is an artist and writer. After 15 years of exploring the fields of education and dance, she turned to photography and writing. Her photographic works have been shown in numerous galleries and artistic venues in Lebanon and abroad. In 2012, Dar Al-Saqi Beirut published her first novella Flashback as well as her subsequent short story collection Haqibatun Bilkade Tura in 2015. After 21 years in Switzerland and Germany, Chaza returned to Lebanon in 2007, where she now lives and works.

Muriel N. Kahwagi is a Beirut-based writer. She is currently researching the politics of documenting sung poetry (zajal) in Lebanon, a project supported by the Arab Fund for Arts and Culture (AFAC).

Sharif Sehnaoui is a free improvising guitarist. Focusing on expanding the intrinsic possibilities of these instruments, he plays electric as well as acoustic guitars, both with and without extended and prepared techniques. After more than a decade in Paris, where he began his career as an improviser in 1998 playing at Instants Chavirés as a member of several orchestras, he now resides in his hometown of Beirut. He has since performed his music all over the world and played at many clubs & festivals such as Moers, Konfrontationen (Nickelsdorf), High Zero (Baltimore), Météo Music Festival (Mulhouse), CTM & Maerzmusik (Berlin), Le Guess Who? (Utrecht), FEST (Tunis), Skanu Mesz (Riga), 100Live (Cairo) and Musikprotokoll (Graz).

Bonus Talk

Nadim Mishlawi, Rana Eid, and Nesrine Khodr at DB Studios Beirut (from right).

On Creativity in Times of Crisis and Truthfulness in Sonic Representation
moderated and produced by Nesrine Khodr

This bonus talk features a conversation with the producers of the TIMEZONES Beirut episode, Rana Eid and Nadim Mishlawi, about conceiving the piece and incorporating storytelling into music composition. In light of the economic and financial collapse that has dominated the landscape in Lebanon since 2019, they also share their thoughts on what a collapsing city sounds like, while architect and composer Mhamad Safa talks about his research in sonic representation and his analytical methods in tackling the sound of warfare. Artist Nesrine Khodr interviewed the Eid-Mishlawi team live at the DB Studios in Beirut, while the conversation with London-Beirut-based Mhamad Safa was conducted via correspondence.

Beirut: Traces of a City – A Pod Poem by Rana Eid and Nadim Mishlawi

Nesrine Khodr is an artist and cultural worker living in Beirut. She has worked across film, performance, and television production and as a dramaturg for performance-based projects.

Mhamad Safa is a musician, architect, and researcher, based between London and Beirut. In 2018, he was a fellow at the Ashkal Alwan HWP. He graduated from the Centre for Research Architecture and is currently a PhD candidate in International Law at the University of Westminster. Safa’s work focuses on multi-scalar spatial conditions and their sonic makeups. He explores their intersections with the aural legacies of traditional and subcultural practices as well as with environments of conflict and violence, often morphed and blurred by geographic and techno-scientific uncertainties. He conveys these auditory inquiries by assembling sound design, micro-sampling, algorithmic sound technology, psychoacoustics, field recordings, and their graphic interpretations.

Playlist

Explore a playlist of artists featured in the TIMEZONES Beirut podcast, their collaborators and their peers in the Beirut community.

Curated by Rayya Badran

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The TIMEZONES podcast series plunges into the world of artists and their practices, asking: what does living and working in culture and the arts involve in different countries, cities, and contexts today? The artists’ thoughts on their moods, their social, political, and intellectual realities and their philosophies (of life) have been worked up into experimental audio collages.

The podcasts run the gamut of formats and content, from straight journalism to experimental and documentary approaches, ethnography and fiction, sound art, and improvisation. The TIMEZONES series endeavours to create new artistic forms of storytelling, listening and exchange across the boundaries of geography, time zones, genres, and practices.

The TIMEZONES podcast series is co-initiated and co-produced by Norient and the Goethe-Institut.

This episode is supported by:

Biography

Nadim Mishlawi is a Lebanese/British composer and filmmaker based in Beirut, Lebanon. In 2006, Nadim co-founded DB Studios, a facility for audio post-production and music production, and has since worked as a composer for a variety of projects ranging from documentaries to fiction films and art installations. Nadim has also published essays for «The New Soundtrack» journal and was invited to lecture at the School of Sound Symposium in London in 2015. Nadim made his directorial debut in 2011 with the documentary «Sector Zero», which won first prize in the Muhr Arab Documentary category at the Dubai International Film Festival in 2011 and the Berlin Art Prize for Film Media Arts in 2013. Nadim currently teaches at the Lebanese Academy of the Arts (ALBA). Follow him on SoundCloud.

Biography

Rana Eid has worked as a sound editor on various Arab and international films for almost 20 years. In 2006, Eid co-founded DB Studios for audio post-production and music production, which partnered with the French association HAL AUDIO in 2017. Since then, Rana has continued to work as a sound editor, most recently on the Oscar-nominated films «The Cave» by Firas Fayyad and «Honeyland» by Tamara Kotevska and Ljubomir Stephanov. In 2017, she directed her first feature documentary, «Panoptic», which premiered at the Locarno Film Festival and was selected for the Norient Film Festival in 2021. In 2020, she became a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Follow her on Facebook ,and X.

Links

Rayya Badran: «The Sound of Beirut’s Underbelly» (Norient)

Anna Trechsel: «Panoptic Q&A» (Norient)

Jörg Scheller: «The Idea of Representation Is Dangerous» (Norient)

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TIMEZONES – Season 1

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The TIMEZONES podcast series plunges into the world of artists and their practices, asking: what living and working in culture and the arts involvse in different contexts today? Season 1 with a focus on Nairobi, Belgrade/Sabac/Zurich, Delhi, the Bay Area, and Rio de Janeiro.

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The TIMEZONES podcast series plunges into the world of artists and their practices, asking: what does living and working in culture and the arts involve in different countries, cities, and contexts today? Season 2 focuses on Beirut, Montréal, Dhaka, Mt Makiling, and Gaza.

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The TIMEZONES podcast series plunges into the world of artists and their practices, asking: what does living and working in culture and the arts involve in different contexts today? Season 3 travels from Budapest to Colombo, Buenos Aires, and Ukraine.

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Golden Beirut: New Sounds from Lebanon

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The first CD release by Norient and Outhere Records focuses on a young generation of musicians from Beirut that is tired of war, fed up with politics, sick of religious madness, and angry about Euro-American exoticism.

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Local Music Scenes and Globalization: Transnational Platforms in Beirut

This book offers the first in-depth study of experimental and popular music in Beirut. 2014 finally out as Paperback and Kindle Edition.

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Published on November 25, 2021

Last updated on October 12, 2023

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Montréal, Your Ears Are My Island by Esther Bourdages

Montréal, Your Ears Are My Island

Podcast

by Esther Bourdages

Episode 7 of the TIMEZONES podcast series, co-initiated and co-produced by Norient and the Goethe-Institut. This episode portrays the diverse music scenes of Montréal. Producer Esther Bourdages traces their global connections and historical roots and explores the effects of gentrification on the city’s cultural life.

I produced a subjective portrait of Montréal’s music through five different voices and five musicians who both live and play music in Montréal. Adam Basanta, Silvano Mercado, Mili Hong, Joseph Sannicandro, and Kimihiro Yasaka are from different geographic areas and work across diverse practices, from sound art to jazz, experimental, contemporary, classical, and world music.

Artist, researcher, writer, and theorist Budhaditya Chattopadhyay inspired me when he stated: «Sound as a creative media socially connects people and places through its manifold travels.» Music has the power to reunite people, musicians, and audiences. I aim to portray the unique touch of Montréal’s music scenes and what it makes possible.

I look to explore, underscore, and analyze the favorable conditions of Montréal’s music scenes that are already rich and developing. The fervor of musicians is often the motor that contributes to building the fabric of the music communities. Musicians share collective experiences, and cultural values are negotiated: openness to the other, welcoming Montréal music scenes, and engagement are the keys. The persona of Montréal’s music is the result of its history, the economic context of a low-cost cosmopolitan city, and the overlap of immigration. The music scenes in Montréal embrace and celebrate multicultural heritages.

Finally, the interviews capture the challenges of being a musician in Montréal, a hip, bohemian international city, highlighting new shifts and new transitions that are slowly cropping up as effects of gentrification. Those changes affect the structure of musicians’ lives. On that note, I interrogate how sustainability echoes the conveniences of modern life.

I would like to thank all the artists participants, Silvano Mercado for the co-editing, mixing, sound design, Hannes Liechti, Svetlana Maraš, and the Goethe-Institut.

A podcast by Esther Bourdegas

Co-initiated and co-produced by Norient and the Goethe-Institut

Featuring: Adam Basanta, Mili Hong, Silvano Mercado Vilches, Joseph Sannicandro, Kimihiro Yasaka

Artistic Editor: Svetlana Maraš
Project Management: Hannes Liechti
Group Photos: Claudia Goulet-Blais
Jingle Voiceover: Nana Akosua Hanson
Jingle Mix: Daniel Jakob
Mastering: Adi Flück, Centraldubs
Artwork: Šejma Fere

→ Full transcript of episode 7

Listen On

→ Listen to further TIMEZONES episodes

Featured Artists

From left to right: Mili Hong, Silvano Mercado Vilches, Esther Bourdages, Joseph Sannicandro, Adam Basanta (photo: Claudia Goulet-Blais).

Adam Basanta is an artist, composer, and performer of experimental music. Born in Tel-Aviv and raised in Vancouver, he has been living and working in Montréal since 2010. Since 2015, his works have been exhibited in international galleries and institutions and won several international prizes, including the Japan Media Arts Prize (2016) and the Aesthetica Art Prize (2017). Remaining active as an experimental composer and performer, his concert music, live performances, and sound recordings have been presented worldwide and won multiple national and international awards.

Mili Hong began playing drums at the age of 16. She spent most of her life in South Korea before moving to Vancouver, Canada, in her early 20s to study English and music. Although she originally planned to move back to Korea after completing her studies, she decided to remain in Vancouver to experiment and explore her new life in Canada’s thriving and diverse music scene. She received a Bachelor of Music in Jazz Studies from Capilano University, majoring in Instrumental Performance, and played in various ensembles from small combos to big bands, presenting her with numerous opportunities to explore different styles of drumming.

Silvano Mercado Vilches is a Parisian of Franco-Chilean origin. He attended the conservatory from an early age and grew up in a very diverse artistic and musical universe. While his career as an instrumentalist and composer takes shape between Latin music, jazz, and electro folk, his love of cinema naturally led him to music for images. This discipline, ideal for tapping into all styles, allows him to share his work between composition and sound creation, leading him to working professionally in several fields: fiction, documentary, experimental, and live improvisation.

Joseph Sannicandro is a writer, sound organizer, and traveler currently living in Montréal. He writes about miss-communication, (un)popular culture, and the labor of creativity and is interested in the analog humanities. Joseph is a PhD candidate in cultural studies and comparative literature at the University of Minnesota. His work has appeared in eContact, .dpi, Carceral Notebooks, the Journal for Sonic Studies, and edited book collections. His dissertation, currently in progress, explores the nature of doing things together through a cultural history of aesthetics and politics in post-1968 Italy.

Kimihiro Yasaka is a Japan native, an active pianist, and a recording artist as well as an enthusiastic educator. He began his piano studies at the age of twelve with Ms. Reiko Mizutani in Japan and went on to completing his Master’s degree in Piano Solo Performance under the supervision of Professor Kyoko Hashimoto at the Schulich School of Music at McGill University in Montréal. Yasaka’s repertoire includes a wide range of styles from Baroque to contemporary music. He is a particularly devoted performer of new music and has performed in several Montréal, Canadian and world premieres.

Bonus Talk

Artists on Real Estate Monsters and Montréal
moderated and produced by Stefan Christoff

In this bonus talk, we hear the producer of the TIMEZONES Tiohtià:ke / Montréal podcast, sound artist, curator and radio host Esther Bourdages, along with the voice of sound artist and academic Joseph Sannicandro. Stefan speaks with both artists about one of the major themes emerging from the main podcast episode: the struggle and debate around access to creative spaces within the urban environment in the context of gentrification and the growing pressures of real estate capital. How can artists survive, overcome, and resist gentrification?

Montréal, Your Ears Are My Island by Esther Bourdages

Musically interwoven into this edition is a segment of the duet track «Orbiting Mercury in a Dream» by bonus talk moderator and producer Stefan Christoff (organ) and Joseph Sannicandro. The piece was released by Élan Vital, a label based in North Macedonia, on the album La lumière du soleil dans un semi sous-sol. View a beautiful video by Guillaume Vallée that accompanies this track.

Stefan Christoff is a community radio host, musician, social activist, and student living in Tiohtià:ke / Montréal. Stefan hosts Free City Radio, a weekly podcast and radio program that airs in the city on CKUT 90.3fm, focusing on the intersections between social justice movements and the arts. As a community activist, Stefan has been deeply involved in migrant justice movements, challenging the violence of the Canadian state’s migration policies that attack the fundamental rights of asylum seekers, non-status people, and immigrants. Stefan has created many albums with artists both locally and internationally, including duet albums with Sam Shalabi, Lori Goldston and as part of Anarchist Mountains and Rêves sonores.

Playlist

Explore a playlist of artists featured in the TIMEZONES Montréal podcast, their collaborators, and their peers in the Montréal community.

Curated by Esther Bourdages

Credits Samples Processed

Adam Basanta. 2016. A Room Listening to Itself, Cassauna / Important Records.

blablatrains (Ana Dall'Ara-Majek and Takuto Fukuda). 2019. «Pythagorean Domino».

Caloia, Epps, Lauzier, Nakatani. 2020. «2sd Set». Live at Café Résonance. Mr. E Records (#14).

Chris Paul Harman. Performed by Kimihiro Yasaka. 2019–20. «Billboard Ver 1: Peg, Here Comed the Rain».

Claude Vivier. Performed by Ensemble Constantinople & Guests, directed by Sandeep Bhagwati. 2019. «Vivier 1», «Bols». … et je reverrai cette ville étrange. Dreyer gaido (21119).

David Kristian. 1999. «Loomis». Room Tone. Alien8 Recordings (ALIENCD19).

Erik Hove Chamber Ensemble. 2017. «Morce Code». Polygon, Inner Circle Music.

Geraldine Eguiluz Sextet. 2021. «Tamales Oaxaquenos». Mexhicah Bones. Studio recording.

Ida Toninato, Jennifer Thiessen. 2018. «Unknow Road». The Space Between US. Ambiances Magnétiques (AM 236).

Ijo, Ivetta Sunyoung Kang. 2020. «Anterior Skin [leftover]».

Jason Sharp. 2018. «Stand Above the Streams, Pt. 1». Stand Above The Streams. Constellation Records.

Jean Derome. 2001. «Dernier Paysage». Canot-Camping: Expédition 4. Ambiances Magnétiques (AM 100).

Lori Freedman. 2019. «Withwhatbecomes». Excess. Collection QB (CQB 1923).

Lynda Gaudreau, Martin Tétreault. 2007. «Tourne-disque No 1, sections 1-2-3». Document 4: A Choreographic Project.

Mili Hong. 2019. «[Experior::04]». Live @ experior::04.

Norsola. 2018. «For Ezra». Howl Live. Howl Arts collective.

Rêves sonores (Nick Schofield and Stefan Christoff). 2021. «Spirodon». Crépuscule. Youngbloods (YBZ032).

Sam Shalabi. 2001. «Outside Chance (Dreamfangs)». On Hashish. Alien8 Recordings (ALIENCD29).

Silvano Mercado Vilches. 2010; 2015. «Phy, Tribal». PHY, TRIBAL.

Simon Bertrand. Performed by Kimihiro Yasaka. 2009–10. «La lune». 22 Miniatures for Piano.

Stefan Christoff & Sam Shalabi. 2014. «Elephantine». Flying Street, Howl Arts Collective.

The TIMEZONES podcast series is co-initiated and co-produced by Norient and the Goethe-Institut.

Biography

Esther Bourdages works in the fields of visual arts and technology art as a writer, independent curator, and scholar. She holds an MA in art history from the Université de Montréal, where she wrote about Swiss sculptor Jean Tinguely and the relationship between sculpture within an expanded field, as multimedia and sound art. Her curatorial research explores art forms such as site-specific art, installation art, and sculpture, often in conjunction with technology (media and digital art). Follow her on Instagram, Facebook, SoundCloud, or on her Blog.

Published on December 30, 2021

Last updated on October 12, 2023

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Staying Creative Between Beauty and Chaos in Rio de Janeiro by Vivian Caccuri

Staying Creative Between Beauty and Chaos in Rio de Janeiro

Podcast

by Vivian Caccuri

Episode 5 of the TIMEZONES podcast series, co-initiated and co-produced by Norient and the Goethe-Institut. This episode explores how Rio has shaped its music over the centuries and invented its future through the vision of artists, creators, and scholars.

«Samba was persecuted, it was a source of embarrassment for a lot of rich, wealthy, Eurocentric Brazilians, but in many ways, it won out. So a lot of the urban spaces that were designed to keep out Black Brazilians and poor Brazilians became the spaces that are now used for street ‹blocos› (carnival blocks) that are now central to grassroots samba during carnival.»
Bruno Carvalho

Behind the picture-postcard landscapes and the stereotypical images of carnival, beaches, and beautiful women lies an enigmatic and broken city: Rio de Janeiro. Rio’s musical and creative identity, such as samba and carnival, seems to be ever transforming and flirting with traditional forms, yet at the same time, those forms have a history of struggle, intimately connected to Afro-Brazilian musical and religious expressions. In a challenging historical moment of crisis, a pandemic and political ruthlessness, artists in Rio are integrating those identities with the most immediate needs and perceptions of reality. The goal is to stay alive, sane, and, most of all, creative.

A podcast by Vivian Caccuri

Co-initiated and co-produced by Norient and the Goethe-Institut

Featuring: Thiago Lanis, Domingos Guimaraens and Ynaiê Dawson (Opavivará), Cabelo Cobral Coral, Thaís Delgado, Bruno Carvalho, Sabrina Fidalgo

Director, Idea, Interviews: Vivian Caccuri
Music: Vivian Caccuri, Thiago Lanis
Additional Samples: Opavivará, MC Bruna Alves, MC Don Juan
Editing: Vivian Caccuri
Artistic Editor: Svetlana Maraš
Project Management: Hannes Liechti
Jingle Voiceover: Nana Akosua Hanson
Jingle Mix: Daniel Jakob
Mastering: Adi Flück, Centraldubs
Artwork: Šejma Fere

→ Full transcript of episode 5

Listen On

→ Listen to further TIMEZONES episodes

Featured Artists

Thiago Lanis is a model as well as a self-taught singer and composer born in Arará, a favela in Northern Rio. Having loved samba, Brazilian popular music and international pop all his life, Thiago uses bass-loaded and delicate rhythmic sounds as his main inspirations and materials for his creations. Thiago is a composer at Estúdio OSSO, a film score studio in Rio de Janeiro.

Opavivará is an art collective from Rio de Janeiro that develops actions in public spaces all over the city, in galleries, and in cultural institutions, proposing inversions in the use of urban space through the creation of relational devices that provide collective experiences. Since its creation in 2005, the group has been actively participating in the Brazilian contemporary art scene.

Cabelo Cobral Coral is a Brazilian artist who lives and works in Rio de Janeiro. Cabelo is a poet, musician, and visual artist. He considers his drawings, paintings, sculptures, songs, performances, videos, and processes of instaurations as manifestations of poetry. He is currently working on the ongoing project «Luz com Trevas»: an exhibition, a show, and a disc that, mixed together, form one single work.

Thaís Delgado is a fashion designer based in Rio de Janeiro and the owner of VERKKO, a brand founded in 2015 that is inspired by her own subjective universe, memories, feelings, and understanding of her context as an Afro-Diasporic woman.

Bruno Carvalho is a professor of literature at Harvard University. He works on cities as lived and imagined spaces and studies relationships between cultural practices and urbanisation with a focus on Brazil. Carvalho’s interdisciplinary approaches bridge history, literary analysis, and urban studies. A Rio de Janeiro native, Carvalho received his Ph.D. from Harvard University (2009) and was a faculty member at Princeton University (2009–2018).

Sabrina Fidalgo is an award-winning Brazilian filmmaker. Her films have been showcased at over 300 national and international film festivals. She studied at the University of Television and Film (HFF) in Munich, Germany, and also studied screenwriting through ABC Guionístas at the University of Cordoba, Spain.

Bonus Talk

Grabbing for a Worldview in Rio de Janeiro
moderated and produced by Daniel Limaverde

The evening Daniel Limaverde first met fellow sound artist Vivian Caccuri was spent in total silence, walking into the night on Rio de Janeiro’s empty streets and neighborhoods for eight hours, accompanied by a group of fifteen silent locals. This activity, proposed by Vivian’s «silent walk» series, spontaneously reveals the sounds of a city, tattooing an indelible impression on the aural awareness of its inhabitants.

In this Bonus Talk, Daniel Limaverde interviewed Vivian Caccuri over the course of a day in the city. While walking around her neighborhood, they reflected on Rio de Janeiro’s social, environmental, and political worldviews and the narratives that feed back into Brazilian society – and outwards into the rest of the world. They also discuss the making of Vivian’s TIMEZONES episode and how her previous body of work in building sound systems and conducting «silent walks» delineates this podcast production.

Staying Creative Between Beauty and Chaos in Rio de Janeiro by Vivian Caccuri

Daniel Limaverde is a music composer, sound artist, and nonfiction audio producer from Rio de Janeiro. He is the founder of the Brazilian podcast boutique Mafuá Audio and host of the nonfiction narrative show Palimpsesto, which investigates themes of Brazilian culture and society by tracing back multiple historical threads. As a musician, Limaverde has participated in international exchanges with Japan (Red Bull Music Academy) and the United States (OneBeat). He also works as a music producer for performing artists, composes soundtracks for cinema, TV shows and podcasts and creates sound art installations.

Playlist

Explore a playlist of artists featured in the TIMEZONES Rio de Janeiro podcast, their collaborators and their peers in the Rio community.

Curated by Vivian Caccuri

The TIMEZONES podcast series is co-initiated and co-produced by Norient and the Goethe-Institut.

Biography

Vivian Caccuri is a sound artist based in Rio de Janeiro. She is interested in sound and music as vehicles to combine experiments in sensory perception with issues related to history and social conditioning. Throughout her career, she has collaborated with musicians such as Arto Lindsay (USA/BR), Gilberto Gil (BR) and Wanlov (Ghana). Her works have been shown at the Venice Biennale, Serpentine Galleries, the Kochi Biennale in India, the Ming Museum in Shanghai, and others. Together with Thiago Lanis, she composes music at OSSO Estúdio Sonoro in Rio de Janeiro. Follow her on Instagram, LinkedIn, or on her Website.

Published on October 28, 2021

Last updated on October 12, 2023

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