Biography | Works | Descriptions | Portrait

by Samir Odeh-Tamimi (german) | by Stefan Fricke

for three electronically amplified recorders (with small percussion) (mit kleinem Schlagwerk) (2001) / Sy. 3652

"Ahinnu I" (2001) for three electronically amplified recorders is the companion piece to "Ahinnu II" for seven instrumentalists (2002). ”Ahinnu” (‘I yearn’) is how the Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish (1941-2008) begins his poem "Illa ummi", which he wrote during his youth and has now become very popular in Palestine. ‘To My Mother’, a poem of love, farewell, and longing addressed equally to mother and homeland, establishes Odeh-Tamimi’s piece as a (childhood) memory, as reflection, as an idea: without creating a musical programme, without being set. Another carrier of memory here is the recorder, an instrument that Odeh-Tamimi learned during schooldays in his homeland, from a Jewish music teacher.

© Stefan Fricke

Biografie | Werke | Werkbeschreibungen | Porträt

[English translation is currently not available]

für Flöte, Oboe, Klarinette, Schlagzeug und Streichtrio (2002) / Sy. 3652

Dieses Stück basiert – wie auch "Ahinnu I" (2001) für drei elektrisch verstärkte Blockflöten – auf dem Gedicht des palästinensischen Dichters Mahmoud Darwish „Illa ummi”, übersetzt „An meine Mutter”, welches er im Alter von 16 Jahren geschrieben hat. Es beginnt mit dem Wort „Ahinnu”, zu Deutsch „Ich sehne mich”. Es ist ein Liebes- und Abschiedsgedicht, gleichzeitig an die eigene Mutter und an die Muttererde gerichtet. „Ahinnu II” ist dem Freiburger Ensemble Aventure gewidmet, das am 9. Februar 2003 in Wiesbaden auch für die Uraufführung sorgte.

Samir Odeh-Tamimi

for seven instrumentalists (2001) Sy. 3653

"Ahinnu II" (2002), composed for flute, oboe, clarinet, percussion and string trio, is the companion piece to "Ahinnu&" (2001) for seven instrumentalists. ”Ahinnu” (‘I yearn’) is how the Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish (1941-2008) begins his poem "Illa ummi", which he wrote during his youth and has now become very popular in Palestine. ‘To My Mother’, a poem of love, farewell and longing addressed equally to mother and homeland, establishes Odeh-Tamimi’s piece as a (childhood) memory, as reflection, as an idea: without creating a musical programme, without being set. The sounds – sustained, vibrating and unstable textures, microtonal melismas picked up from Koranic chant, punctuated by sharp percussion accents – flow forcefully towards a sudden condensed finale: an outcry, a self-siting.

© Stefan Fricke

for eight instrumentalists (1999) / Sy. 3650

"Anín" (‘an inner secret crying’) is the earliest piece of which Samir Odeh-Tamimi recognises the validity. He wrote it in 1999 as a student of composition in a class taught by Younghi Pagh-Paan for a Tel Aviv ensemble. At that time Odeh-Tamimi was intensively concerned with his origins and identity, and was thinking, amongst others, of his grandfather, who was a Sufi singer and healer. Anín is a mystic ecstasy in sound form. This music flows in energetic peace in an ever-flowing river, and evokes, through repeated harsh suspensions, short flashbacks to the musical traditions of his origin; however, in accordance with the title, these origins remain secret.

© Samir Odeh-Tamimi, translated by Trevor Burvill

[English translation is currently not available]

für großes Ensemble (2008) / Sy. 3920

"Chihangir" ist der Name des Viertels, wo ich in Istanbul einen ganzen Monat gewohnt habe. Auf der Suche nach dem Klang in dieser riesigen Stadt voller Geschichten war ich verzweifelt, bis ich gemerkt habe, dass ich an jedem Ort einen anderen Klang höre. Und doch sind die Rufe der Muezzine, die fünfmal am Tag überall in der Stadt zu hören sind, allgegenwärtig. Ich betrachte dieses Stück als ein musikalisches Tagebuch. Manche können so wunderbar singen. Manche schreien nur.

Samir Odeh-Tamimi (Programmheft der UA Frankfurt 11.10.2008)

for six solo voices and two trombonists (2010/11) / Sy. 4138

"Garten der Erkenntnis", for six voices and two trombones was composed by Samir Odeh-Tamimi in 2011, on commission from Stuttgart’s Musik der Jahrhunderte and the Neue Vocalsolisten. The piece is based on the poem of the same name by the Sufi mystic Mansur Al-Hallaj (858-922), as well as a dream of Odeh-Tamimi’s. In his dream, the composer saw an old, scrawny man with a white beard. Clad in a green robe, with a red turban on his head, the man hovered above the floor, holding a frame drum in his hand. Odeh-Tamimi realised he was a Sufi sheik, and asked him whom he was. “I”, he answered, ”am one of those can never be assailed by sleep.” Then he laughed loudly, turned sharply twice, started drumming and sang: “ka an na ha ka an na hu.” After this, he flew out through the window into the sky. A few days later, Odeh-Tamimi told a friend about his dream, and the latter, well-versed in Sufi mysticism, told him “that was Al-Hllaj” and directed him to the poem "Garden of Knowledge". Up to this point, Odeh-Tamimi hadn’t known about it, but after reading it he decided to set it, in exactly the way it had come to him in his dream: “ka an na ha ka an nah u.” This persistent, sharply rhythmically organised sequence of sounds, along with the variety of microintervallic vibrati and glissandi in the melodic line (inspired by Koranic chant) create an extremely vital, almost wild ritual that scarcely pauses for breath. Striking solos and sharply contoured out-of-phase duos give rise overall to a tightly knit vocal mesh, a deliberate tangle. Markings for the singers (also active as percussionists) include: “rather angry, and with various kinds of vibrato, brief interruptions, and sometimes singing nasally” (bass, bar 43 ff.), “almost yelled, everyone independently, as fast as possible” (bar 120 f.), and “yelled, rapid, chaos” (the final bars). Sometimes ‘chorally’ enlarged by the two trombones, they implant powerful signals within this vitalist process, this sound-body-ceremony – enduring sonic symbols of knowledge.

© Stefan Fricke

for three sopranos and chamber orchestra (2004/05) / Sy. 3664

Samir Odeh-Tamimi has provided a brief commentary on his work "Gdadrója" for chamber orchestra and three sopranos, composed in 2005: “It is a feeling of powerless, but not of resignation; it is the recognition of what is happening; from the pain one is forced to feel comes a watchful gaze.” The title is a coined one: it brings together the names of two places which – in today’s real world, as well as historically, mythologically and emblematically – embody war, aggression, brutality and destruction: Baghdad and Troy. And the music placed under this lethal sign, posing an eternal threat since the beginnings of humanity, is articulated with no less violence, force, and entrenchment, yet stated more neutrally - these are, after all, just sounds organised consciously in time. in an artspace – energetic, organic and unrestrained. "Gdadrója" turns out to be a seven-minute tour de force, acoustically over-the-top, with four brief, textless entries by the sopranos, triple forte and in the highest register. "Gdadrója" offers no consolation. Rather, it is a remorseless shriek-song, thrust at the civilisation whose barbarism it opposes.

© Stefan Fricke

for Cello and Piano (2009) / Sy. 4039

The subtitle of "Jabsurr" for cello and piano, composed in 2009, explains the meaning of its Arabic title: “... letting one’s gaze drift over something…”. In Samir Odeh-Tamimi’s duo the cello has the highlighted main role; for long stretches it acts as soloist, and it opens and ends the work. And yet the piece is a snapshot: despite lasting a good twelve minutes, despite varied playing techniques, as well as constant, extreme changes of register and timbre including microtonal nuances, huge dynamic range, vrtuosic, declamatory-improvisatory gestures, along with whip-like piano actions, and screens of clusters. "Jabsuur" freezes an extended moment, aurally eyes off an imaginary environment. Maybe it is even a real one. The ending glistens.

© Stefan Fricke

[English translation is currently not available]

für Flöte, Klavier und Schlagzeug (2004) / Sy. 3659

„Li-Umm-Kámel”, zu Deutsch: „Für Umm Kámel”, meiner Urgroßmutter in Erinnerung. Zu diesem Werk gibt es keinen Text. Umm Kámel ist ihr Name, ich habe sie sehr geliebt und habe dieses Werk für sie in Erinnerung geschrieben. "Li-Umm-Kámel" entstand im Auftrag des Phœnix Ensemble Basel.

Samir Odeh-Tamimi

[English translation is currently not available]

für vier arabische Musiker und Kammerensemble (2007) / Sy. 3762

„Madih” – zu Deutsch „Lobgesang” – ist ein sehr wichtiges religiöses Ritual bei den Sufis. Das Werk versucht ein Gleichnis zu statuieren: Das Miteinander und Sich-Ergänzen der Kulturkreise sollte nicht nur auf der Bühne eines Konzerthauses möglich sein. "Madih" ist Vinko Globokar gewidmet und wurde vom Konzerthaus Berlin in Auftrag gegeben. Die Uraufführung erfolgte dort am 27. September 2007, Ferenc Gábor leitete das Ensemble United Berlin.

Samir Odeh-Tamimi

for solo recorder and male choir (2010) / Sy. 4047

"Madjnun II" for solo recorder and male choir, written in 2010, is a companion piece to "Madjnun I" for recorder and string orchestra (2009). The basis of both these works by Samir Odeh-Tamimi is the traditional story of Qaysibn al-Mulawwah, who probably lived in the north of the Arabian Peninsula in the 7th century. He falls in love with Layla. She – version 1 – doesn’t return his love, or – version 2 – she loves him too, but the parents prevent them from being together. At any rate, Qays pines for Layla and becomes a ‚majnun‘, a ‘madman’. He writes only love poems, leaves his family, goes into the desert, lives with animals, feeds the way they do, and becomes a mystic, a Sufi. "Layla and Majnun" is one of the greatest, most meaningful stories of the Arab and Persian tradition – even to this day. In the 12th century the Persian poet Nizami Ganjavi (1141-1209) gathered together all the sources he knew of, both secular and mystical about Qays, or Majnun, and wrote the book "Layla and Majnun", which contributed greatly to popularising the story; it was also Samir Odeh-Tamimi’s point of reference. In his Majnun works – which also include the full-length music theatre work "Leila und Madjnun", premiered at the Ruhr Triennale in 2010 – the recorder embodies the inner voice of the errant poet in the desert, his torment, his disquiet. The virtuoso (spiritual) exercises on a renaissance Ganassi tenor recorder, with its robust sound, and a bass recorder, were evolved in close collaboration with the soloist Jeremias Schwarzer. Alongside this old wind instrument – albeit a new one for present-day music – stands an 18-part male choir. There’s no text: it sings vocalises, soft and hard consonants, and grounds what is happening in flexible bands of sound, thus multiplying the solo part. In addition, it plays finger cymbals and seashell chimes, as well as a frame drum filled with rice and peas. The music emanates a restless atmosphere: of air in motion, and breathless thought.

© Stefan Fricke

for seven instrumentalists (2009) / Sy. 4040

The piece "Philaki" for (piccolo) flute, (bass) clarinet, harp and string quartet, written in 2009, creates an oppressive aural image, yet also one that rises up against adversity. Samir Odeh-Tamimi uses isolated, forceful low harp pizzicati to create the basic situation: a striking, recurrent pattern of sounds. Seconds later, already surrounded by microtonal string textures, lineations on flute and clarinet come into play. All this, at high volume, triggers a brief point of repose. During this, using seashell-chimes, the harp player shakes out a rhythm that suggests someone dragging their way through shingle. This scene is repeated. New gestures arise (iron springs are struck, producing mini-clusters). The oppressiveness remains, but so too does the energy, the resistance posed against it, occasionally counteracted by dreamlike harp and flute sounds. The clarinet sings: not beautifully, more like groaning. Time after time there are brief moments where things come to a halt, though they never signal an end to inhibiting factors. The (musical) solution: a long fade-out, reluctant acceptance of the situation. The title "Philaki" gives a clue. The Greek word φυλακή(= fylakí) means prison. And as Samir Odeh-Tamimi has said in conversation „the harp strings seem like prison bars.“

© Stefan Fricke

for baritone and orchestra (2006) / Sy. 3739

Samir Odeh-Tamimi based his piece "shira shir" for male voice and orchestra, composed in 2007, on the epic poem Dos lied vun e mojs gehargetn jidischn volk by the Polish author Yitzhak Katzenelson. Murdered by the Nazis in1944 at the age of 57, Katzenelson was involved in the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, and this was also where he wrote (in Yiddish) his “Song of the Slain Jewish People”. Odeh-Tamimi has rendered it in lvrit, giving fragments to the male voice which, along with a few cantilena without fixed pitch, sings loud, glissandoing and even yelled falsetto accusations against God, who has abandoned his people and lets them die in concentration camps, against hopelessness, against terror, against senseless death. The cantata “Sing a Song” (in lvrit: “shira shir”), in which Odeh-Tamimi commemorates the Holocaust's millions of victims, has no soft side. It is expressive, energetic, striking and massive. The vocal party and the orchestral clusters, with their raw interjections, meld together in a great outcry. They combat injustice in utterly exemplary fashion, though probably in the knowledge that a song, however deafening and devastating, can scarcely prevail.

© Stefan Fricke

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