Masaa - Beit (2023) [Official Digital Download]

German based group Masaa is set to release their fourth album titled “Beit” on April 28th on Traumton Records. For a number of years now the group has been compelling audiences in both the East (from Tunisia to Azerbaijan and Turkey) and the West (from Spain to Germany and Great Britain).

On there last album “Irade” that was awarded the 2021 German Jazz Prize in the category Vocal Album of the Year saw the group expand it’s line-up with the addition of their new member Reentko Dirks, whose guitar mastery added spectacular new facets to the group’s sound. On this new album, the band further expands it’s musical, their unique sonic language and the creative will of everyone involved.

Just the title track alone seems like a breathtaking roller coaster ride through emotions and subtle musical changes. Initially calm, almost contemplative, with delicate strings, sensitive vocals the song changes radically halfway through moving to an odd-meter groove. Rabih Lahoud raps cascades of syllables and words, sometimes in direct dialogue with Rust. Also in “Nabat” Lahoud reveals his chanting skills, alternating between accentuated spoken poetry and melodic passages. Songs with tempo and drive, including “Racines” and “Resistance” sung in French, as well as the sprightly optimistic “Flowers”, create contrasts to slower pieces like “Mantra” and “Sukuni”, whose intensity results from reduction. In between, there are pieces like “Return” with a strikingly dynamic development.

Rabih Lahoud’s captivating vocal range spanning over several octaves, consistently forms the quartet’s gravitational center. While Lahoud writes all the lyrics, the compositions are mainly by Rust and Dirks. “But they are more like sketches rather than full scores,” says Lahoud, explaining the collective working process, “everyone contributes ideas, and as a result the music never stays the way it was originally notated.” To develop the new repertoire together, the quartet retreated to an old house in the region Bergisches Land in May 2021. “It’s located far away from all urban distractions, so we couldn’t do anything else there but our music,” Rabih Lahoud laughs.

TRACKLIST

1. Masaa - Nabad
2. Masaa - Beit
3. Masaa - Mantra
4. Masaa - Racines
5. Masaa - Zeryab
6. Masaa - Secret of the Wings
7. Masaa - Flowers
8. Masaa - Return
9. Masaa - Sukuni
10. Masaa - La Resistance
11. Masaa - Abun Rahal
12. Masaa - Lotus
13. Masaa - Tout ce qui nous reste
14. Masaa - Freedom Dance



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