005. Ashkan Behzadi

Ashkan Behzadi’s music combines a miniaturist lyrical craft with an aim to invoke the collective-memory of folklore music through the use of allusion and pastiche. The question of genre-identity and genre-blurring and, in particular, the relationship between modern lyric and contemporary music is at the core of his aesthetic and artistic research. In this episode, Marina Kifferstein and Charlotte Mundy of TAK speak to Ashkan about his piece “Az hoosh mi..” for the violin and soprano, in which the musical dimension of the text, an erotic post-language Persian modern poem, expands in the texture of the music to create an elaborated heterophonic relationship between the voice and violin. “Az hoosh mi…” is featured on TAK’s recent album, Oor. To stream and purchase Oor: takensemble.bandcamp.com To learn more about Ashkan’s music: https://soundcloud.com/ashkan-behzadi