Woven Landscapes by Karavan Sarai
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Woven Landscapes by Karavan Sarai
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Karavan Sarai
If you're searching for your life's purpose and have the means to spend many years in Asia and the Middle East on such a quest, I'd say go and do it. After all, the fruition of your curiosity could turn out to be as rich and wonder-inducing as the music of Karavan Sarai, a duo comprised of multi-instrumentalist/singer Narayan Sijan and producer/musician/master electronic tinkerer Carmen Rizzo. Sijan grew up in the American Midwest but spent the bulk of his adult life traveling, learning and residing in India, China, Nepal, Turkey, Israel, Egypt and those points in between that were once stops along the Silk Road. That ancient network of trade routes was the cultural and economic connective tissue between the Mediterranean and the Far East for centuries, and it's no surprise that such an epic-length thoroughfare has been the inspiration for a likewise vast amount of music.
Woven Landscapes Artist release (www.karavansaraimusic.com)
Woven Landscapes is an apt title for an album that earns a rightful place in that body of work. The sound can be likened to an aural tapestry, with Sijan's articulate touch on oud, saz, buzuk, baglama and setar complimented gracefully by Rizzo's keyboards, percussion and characteristically restrained electronics. Sijan's vocals come and go with the feel of encounters along a journey, which the anecdotal liner notes allude to and the songs amply reflect, with source material ranging from regional music traditions to sounds inspired by scenic vistas. Rhythmic and melodic shifts within the tracks suggest that Sijan's adventures were not without unexpected turns and surprising musical discoveries. His interpretation of them, as on the Sufi love song “Upon My Own Hand,” consistently benefits from his and Rizzo's creative embellishments. It's that creativity, applied to a range of Middle Eastern and Central Asian motifs, which make Woven Landscapes a most pleasing and evocative listen. -Tom Orr
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