GILGAMESH PUT TO MUSIC:

Shaheen builds musical bridges between cultures
By Alexander Varty (Straight.com)

Although Simon Shaheen has been a professional musician since he was in his teens, his real job is building bridges—between cultures, sonic styles, and listeners of all sorts. At the moment, for instance, he’s writing a concert for oud—the acoustic guitar of the Arab world—and orchestra, commissioned by the Detroit Symphony. And, as Shaheen explains from his Brooklyn, New York, home, there’s more to this than simply waltzing in with an armful of sheet music.

“I am scheduled to go there twice, just to work with the strings on microtonality and certain concepts of ornamentation that we use in Arabic music,” says the Palestine-born musician, a powerful performer on both the oud and the violin. “Now, this doesn’t mean that the composition will be pure Arabic music…but the context will definitely be symphonic.”

Another collaboration, with storyteller Margaret Wolfson, recasts the legend of Gilgamesh, an ancient king of the region now known as Iraq. “The big question was, ‘How does Gilgamesh relate to what’s going on today?’ ” Shaheen notes. “So we want to…connect this historic epic to contemporary Iraq, especially under the circumstances.”

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Actually, I should have said Gilgamesh put to music again.