L’Algérie (2024)
for Extended Piano, Violin, Cello and Oud, with optional hand percussion

total duration: ~45 minutes

In nine movements:

I mémorial
II - Aïn Bessem
III - joie - sur les mélodies de Karim Ziad
IV - interlude 1
V - la reine
VI - les cloches
VII - gnawa loops
VIII - inconnue
IX- traverser

First version premiered by Either/OR (Jennifer Choi, violin, John Popham, cello, Bahar Badieitabar, oud, Richard Carrick, piano, Rafael Heredia percussion) on February 20, 2024 at Berklee in Boston, MA.

NYC Premiere of final version by Either/Or: Bahar Badieitabar oud, Richard Carrick piano, Jennifer Choi violin, John Popham cello, Justin Jay Hines, percussion on October 1, 2024 at Miller Theatre, Columbia University, New York, NY.

L’Algérie was written in December and January 2024 in Boston and Holland.

Some of these movements are stand alone pieces to be played in improvised lead sheets with drums. They were premiered on August 29, 2024 at The Stone as part of Jennifer Choi’s residency.

Program notes

L'Algérie (2024) is an introspective followup to The Atlas (2023), incorporating references to my maternal heritage, specifically through melody. 

My family left Algeria for Paris after WWII, but in many ways their Algerian lifestyle continued: my grandparents continued speaking in Arabic, continued preparing hearty couscous meals, even as their children assimilated to life in France. My mother, along with the cohort of Algerian-born French, is referred to as French pied noir - and my generation, children born in France of pied noir, are sometimes referred to pied gris.  Identities intersect, evolve, and engage these histories across generations.

I first took to the music of the Maghreb (a region defined by the Atlas Mountains!) in my 20’s through recordings, and have dug deeper into it at different stages of my life. My composition The Atlas has a movement referencing El Gusto, a 1950’s Chaabi band consisting of Jews and Muslims, reunited 50 years later, which was the springboard for this piece. 

As is often the case, the piece the one plans to write is not the piece that ends up being written! I was initially drawn to the entrancing and elaborate polyrhythms of North African dance music. But as I wrote this piece, it was the Arabic and Cantoral styles of melody that most found their way into this score. 

There are short melodic references incorporated into this score. Reinette l’Oraniste (1917-1998) was blind oud player and singer from Algeria who also relocated to Paris, and whose recordings are considered definitive versions of the Arab-Andalus style. One of her best known melodies is quoted in mémorial and interlude 1. Karim Ziad (b. 1966) is a drummer and percussionist from Algeria who is an expert in North African grooves, with infectious Chaabi rhythms and upbeat sense of melody.  In joie and gnawa loops, there are references to his tune The Joker, as well as Kommi, his collaboration with Mehdi Nassouli and Omri Mor. Aïn Bessem is the name of the town where my maternal family is from, and movement with the same name briefly references an excerpt of a 1927 Cantoral recording for voice and oud. The other identifiable melodies throughout the piece are my own, including the extended melodies les cloches, traverser, joie and la reine (with a very brief reference to Ravel).

This composition is not a nostalgic or romanticized reference to the past: rather, it is about the musical dialogue I have had with this place and history across several dates, always wondering where the future might be.

This piece is dedicated to my family from Algeria, and in memory of my uncle Alain Arphi, who always dreamed big.