Musical Journeys: Capturing Spontaneous Moments

After a full day of workshops with Amir El-Saffar, as night fell and darkness began to settle in while we rested and packed up our equipment, the musicians took out their instruments again. Some placed their instruments on their laps, starting the jam session before even setting up the table for their musical instrument. With his camera and voice recorder turned off, Pshtiwan Babakir moved with an urgency. You can hear his breath quickening as he navigated between his recording tools. He captured spontaneous moments using an experimental approach that wove the footage into a vibrant tapestry of sound and movement. This piece was inspired by Omar Mohammed, the director of the Volunteer with Us Foundation, who was softly humming some Maqamat written by Mansour al-Hallaj, the 10th-century mystic, poet, and Sufi teacher setting the stage for this breathtaking piece to unfold.