Niyaz

Flights & Sounds of Summer

September 12, 2009, 8:00 PM
Free Admission, $8 Parking (Map)

“Call it Sufi music or World Fusion, but one thing is for sure, the band Niyaz is an Iranian musical trio whose debut album ranked #1 on world music charts on iTunes…” This is trance music for the 21st century: hypnotic, ecstatic, ghostly, delicious. Azam Ali, best known as half of the popular duo Vas, is the vocalist heard on the soundtrack of “The Matrix: Revolution”; Loga Ramin Torkian, formerly of Axiom of Choice, is a master of Persian and Turkish musical traditions. Loga and Azam are accompanied by tabla, bass, violin and laptop.

In the wrong hands, the duo’s mix of tradition and electronics could have been a disastrously contrived effort. However, Niyaz’s Azam Ali and Loga Ramin Tarkian have taken chances with their traditions but never take them for granted. Their enhancements only make the old music forms all the more mystical and enfolding. Niyaz means “yearning” in both Farsi and Urdu and that certainly is one of the moods running through their questing music.

The group got together in Los Angeles four years ago. Azam Ali, she of the group’s ethereal vocals (which graced the soundtrack to Matrix Revolutions), was previously in the duo Vas. Multi-instrumentalist Loga Ramin Tarkian was in Axiom of Choice. They will be accompanied by several other musicians at their Great Park performance, necessary to recreate the lush sounds the two accomplish in the studio. The instruments used include Persian fiddles and lutes, the Turkish saz and cumbus, Indian tablas and laptop computers. Artist Website