Scattering Stars Like Dust

Kayhan Kalhor | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (June 9, 1998)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Traditional Crossroads
• ASIN: B000006OIH
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #229,318 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #58 in Music > World Music > Middle East > Iran

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

42 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A perfect album, May 24, 1999

By 

[e-mail] (U.S.A.) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Scattering Stars Like Dust (Audio CD)

Kalhor is best known to U.S. audiences for his work as 1/3 of Ghazal, the group that fuses Hindustani and Persian music. On this release he focuses on his own tradition, the classical Persian tradition, updating it with somber Kurdish folk melodies and, of course, his own innovations on the kemancheh, or spiked fiddle. As with all austere, composition-based performances, the innovations here are extremely subtle and Kalhor maintains the mood of the piece over the entirety of the album. Pejman Hadadi, the percussionist, provides rolling cascades of sound in complex rythmic tandem with Kalhor's kemancheh. Hopefully Kalhor's solitary updating of Persian classical music will continue along with the fusion of Ghazal.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Musicians Scattered Like Stardust, May 19, 2008

By 

Giordano Bruno (Wherever I am, I am.) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Scattering Stars Like Dust (Audio CD)

An amazing number of the most outstanding musicians in the 'classical' traditions of India, Pakistan, China, Bolivia, and the rest of the world are living and performing in the USA. Of course, politics and poverty drive them away from home, but to "our" cultural credit, appreciative audiences in the USA also draw them here while in their homelands western pop prevails. Kayhan Kalhor is one such musician, the greatest virtuoso of the Persian spiked fiddle, the kamancheh, living in... Berkeley, California.

The kamancheh is a long-necked fiddle with four strings, tuned with huge pegs from the term "spiked fiddle" comes. The sound box is small, about the size of a coconut. The picture of Kalhor shows him sitting on his knees with his kamancheh on a peg upright between his thighs. Very similar fiddles are found throughout China and south Asia. His colleague, Pejman Hadadi sits cross-legged, playing the tombak, a single ceramic drum struck with the fingers of both hands. Besides the picture, the accompanying booklet contains an ample description of the ideas and practices of Persian music, though a few of the claims of antiquity and influence should be taken with salt.

Kalhor's music is improvisational, based on modal structures and simple remembered fragments of melody. It doesn't sound the least like jazz but it has affinities in performance practice. There are only three tracks on this CD. In other words, Kalhor was "world enough and time" to develop his improvisations and communicate his musical ideas. That is as it should be; far too many "ethnographic" recordings are mere snippets of extended works. This is music which requires commitment from the listener as well as the performer - commitment of attention and empathy.

I imagine that the "thrilling" rhythms of the tombak will be easily appreciated by all, putting people in mind of Scheherazade. The komancheh has a snarly, complex tone that may take a while to ingratiate itself. But it's worth the effort; this is music of subtlety and vitality, even in exile.

10 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Most beautifull Kamancheh recordings in the recent years., June 25, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Scattering Stars Like Dust (Audio CD)

Kayhan Kalhor is one of most accomplished Kamancheh players in the Iranian music industry. His latest CD reflects his abilities as a master of this instrument. A wonderfull CD to listen to and appreciate.