New Moroccan Music
A concert held Friday to raise money for refugees in Darfu was put on by the Muslim Student Association at Stanford University in California. The concert that was titled Melodies From the Muslim World, featured many artists playing traditional music from Muslim countries. Among the artists, featured, was Yassir Chadley and his band. Mr. Chadley, originally from Morocco, realized his long held dream of mixing Western and Moroccan music together last year with his Mo’Rockin Project album, Sahaba. He collaborated with trumpeter Kahlil Shaheed to blend together jazz improv, and R&B with sounds from Morocco.
Yassir Chadley has mastered many Moroccan instruments. His talents have been requested by other artists such as Omar Sosa and Randy Westen, to name a couple. He felt like he was always a guest. He never felt like other artists had the time or inclination to combine Western and Moroccan melodies until he started working with Kahlil Shaheed. He now feels that the door has opened with the Mo’Rockin Project. Yassir Chadley grew up in Casablanca where traditional music is just part of life. Every Moroccan celebration uses music. Mr. Chadley, who now lives in Berkley, came home from a visit to his homeland, full of ideas how to use the Moroccan melodies. Together with Kahlil Shaheed, they wrote music using this as inspiration.
Both men are strong in their Muslim faith. Yassir Chadley sees their music as method of showing that Islam as a religion spreads love to Muslims and non Muslims alike. He feels that Muslims are a sincere, caring people that respect everyone. Artists can use their talents to demonstrate this with harmonies from different styles of music.
Carole Morris, JBT Adventure Journalist
Brought to you by: Morocco News on Journey Beyond Travel
Source: Andrew Gilbert, Mercury News
Tags: morocco morocco news morocco travel morocco music islam
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May 15th, 2007 at 5:21 am
[…] Ministry of Culture will address the problem and work in collaboration with artists to bring young Moroccan musicians to their full cultural potential. For many years it seemed that no one was interested in protecting […]