Featuring award-winning clarinetist Kinan Azmeh and percussionist Brian Shankar Adler, this program explores the fluid space between improvisation and composition, drawing on classical, jazz, and Syrian folk elements. Elements project features three pieces by Azmeh, including the premiere of a new piece for strings, his Suite for Improviser and Orchestra, and In The Element, originally scored for string quartet and clarinet. In The Element takes its name from the experience of a warm summer run in the rain, and speaks to broader themes of feeling in (or out) of one’s element musically and culturally. These themes are echoed in Kareem Roustom’s Dabke for String Orchestra and Brian Shankar Adler’s Rudram, based on a Vedic chant that he heard growing up in an ashram.

Program

Dabke – Kareem Roustom
Syrian Dances – Kinan Azmeh – world premiere
In The Element – Kinan Azmeh
Rudram – Brian Shankar Adler
Suite for Improvisor and Orchestra – Kinan Azmeh