Open Data Service, University of Southampton

Grammy Award-winner Kayhan Kalhor is regarded as the world’s greatest master of the kamancheh (Persian violin).

One of the most exciting of his many projects is his duo with the renowned Turkish baglama player Erdal Erzincan. Their album The Wind was released in 2006 by ECM and their collaboration has remained vibrant ever since. Their music is inspired by the classical music traditions of Persia and Ottoman Turkey. These traditions share a great deal in common, including the ancient modal compositional system known as maqam. Improvisation plays a definitive role in their intensely spiritual and emotional performances.

Their music interweaves ecstatic rhythms with sensual melodic phrases. The result is a set of instrumental compositions that flow into each other like one continuous work. In gently drifting passages, their two instruments echo and improvise on different phrases.

Kalhor and Erzincan inhabit everything they play as bees inhabit a hive, wagging to invisible rhythms and joining the almighty hum that activates every soul to buzz its wings. What we have, then, is the honey. ecmreviews.com