Baghdad Lute [Import]

Nassir Shamma | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (November 16, 1999)
• Original Release Date: November 16, 1999
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Import
• Label: Institut du Monde Arabe
• ASIN: B000034D5H
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (22 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #211,847 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #5 in Music > World Music > Middle East > Iraq

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Unusual and beautifully expressive playing, September 19, 2002

By 

greg taylor (Portland, Oregon United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Baghdad Lute (Audio CD)

I am not as expert as many of the other reviewers are on oud playing. I have listened to a fair number of players and like many of the reviewers below, I was surprised at the playing on this disc. This music does not fit the stereotype of Near Eastern music- in point of fact, in many ways this disc is more reminiscent of a bravura recital by a musician from the Western classical music tradition.
The lute playing to my ears in nontraditional. Naseer Shamma's style incorporates techniques from many different instruments not least classical and flamenco guitar strumming techniques. The harmonic base is traditional to the Iraqi school of oud playing and is wonderfully interesting to these jaded Western ears.
One last note- there is one way that I would like to take exception to many of the reviewers below. I bought this album, as I frequently do, sound unheard and listened to it without benefit of much on the information below as to the stories behind the songs. This music stands alone. I fell in love with it before I read of Naseer Shamma's attempts to convey stories of the Gulf War. The piece about the bombing of the orphanage is quite obviously about something like that and belongs to the international tradition of protest music that uses instrumental sound effects to convey horror- does anyone else remember Jimi Hendrix playing the Star Spangled Banner during the Vietnam war?
Enjoy this album as pure music or enjoy it as protest or both.
What we do have here is a innovative musician steeped in an ancient tradition conveying the vitality of that traditon for the present day. The fact that he is from a nation whose government my government is trying to demonize is perhaps a bonus in that it helps to remind us that behind the Iraqi government is a people from whom we have much to learn and whom remain our brothers and sisters.

19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Naseen Shamma the golden fingers of lute, March 17, 2000

By 

Moneer Cherie "Persecuted" (Australia) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Baghdad Lute (Audio CD)

NASEER SHAMMA, one of the greatest lute soloist players in the world, Came out of a school that dats back to 2350 BC from MESOPOTAMIA. NASEER a native babylonian from IRAQ has nine (9) music pieces in this CD all composed by him & each of them has a story to go with, he play them live on stage, showing his style and a very nice music rhythm to them. In track 6 on this CD which is called (Babylonian prayer) played in pentatonic scale he put you in a pryer atmosphere creating what might have been a Babylonian music in ancient times, his inspration was a Babylonian bas-relief. track 9 is a very famous iraqi golfwar tragedy, A shelter with a number of kids taken refuge was bombed killing every one, NASEER play this piece as a soundtrack to this tragedy telling it in music how it happened. track 1 is called Memories, track 2 is An oriental love story( qissat hubb sharqyya),track 3 is Soft breezes(a dansing peice), track 4 is A quiet night in baghdad ( didn't have a lot of in the past years), track 5 called from Ashur to Seville (ASHUR the great king of ASSYRIA the king of the world),track 7 iraqi song (an improvisation in maqam bastanikar purely oriental in nature and typical of traditional music from Iraq) track 8 is a Dialogue between two great Iraqi poets El Mutanabbi and El Sayyab ( This dialogue between old and new, tradition and modernism EL Mutanabbi of an Abasid poet of the golden age & El Sayyab (1926-1964)...

It is very a nice music stories, I recommend this CD to every one that loves lute or just love music in general it is a wonderful CD. all the best to you Naseer! ps: we need more lute cd's of you on Amazon.com!

12 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The true Naseer Shamma, March 30, 2002

By 

Kais (UAE) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Baghdad Lute (Audio CD)

I've noticed that some people wrote thier reviews without truly understanding what Naseer's music is all about.. Mr. Shamma's style is very different than any other solo artist, he tends to tell a story is every one of his master pieces. The sirens that some readers refer to are actually sounds of war sirens, planes and bombs. The piece is called "Happened in Al Amiriya", a city in southern Iraq that had an orphanage which was inhialted in an American bombing campaign in 1994..It claimed the lives of more than 200 orphans.. Mr. Shamma was living that horrifying experience through his music. And If the listners are aware of the the stories behind Mr. Shamma's music, I guarantee you, they will be hooked!! Naseer is the absolute lord of the lute, and he is incredibly talented. Infact he is beyond musician, I cant come up with a word to discribe his work. May sound a little extreme but this is how I feel after years of following his perfomances and his artistry.