Dive into creative process of composer Atefeh Einali

Portrayed within the online edition of Audiograft - Oxford's annual festival of experimental music and sound Art: This project was presented by Toward sounds by Dr. Ruth Wiesenfeld which was an online exhibition in Berlin, Germany. You can also listen to Atefeh's piece "I am from nowhere" released by Deutchlandfunk radio Germany after that exhibition.

Image: composition sketches by Atefeh Einali

Atefeh has been collaborating with the ARC project as a composer and Santoor player. Until now she has composed a solo piece for voice called "I am lonely" and she has performed in the flickering by James McIlwrath. Currently she is composing a piece for Flute and Harp.

Atefeh got commission to write a solo piece for Sitar. The piece called Invisible and it is exploring possibilities of combination Iranian and Indian music genre.

The Voice, for solo violin, was premiered by Jae-Won Lee on April 29, 2018, in Zutphen, the Netherlands. I have composed The Voice to raise the voices of all women like me in order to say that you are not alone.​

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This piece is published by women and music: A Journal of Gender and Culture, University of Nebraska Press. The piece was performed for the second time in Hime online festival by Saba Yousefi.

From Atefeh: We want to make a journey for our audiences step by step from the first piece to feel kindness, love, humanism, fear, sometimes anger, sadness, and all of our emotions, as we felt when we were composing these pieces. In our music, you see the merging of east and west. The Iranian part shows the new concept in making intervals, for example in Segah Dastgah we focus on one note that has an unusual tune in Iranian music (this is a quarter note). Also, in Chahargah Dastgah we have "Mojanab intervals" (135-145 cents), this is the third interval that is made with a quarter note. So, we want to merge these new intervals with the tonal ones in western music and arrange them with electronic processes, with noises, breathing sound, and singing that show our feelings in an innovative atmosphere. Finally, we want our words as music to connect with people around the world because music is a language that everybody understands.
From Melanie: For many months we sent messages to each other. Many with audio, even more in the Telegram app’s face ‘circle'. The first message that Atefeh sent was the video of the santoor with an explanation about tuning and the way it can be struck with different hammers. And then she played it and I was amazed and drawn in by its timbre and harmonies.
Circle Messages came together out of a need to hear our melodies, and to pair distinct harmonies with time-travelled noisy electrotextures. Often playful, with sections that occasionally jar, our sounds went from Tehran to Melbourne; from Melbourne to Tehran, to give form to our compositions. Sometimes this geographical space is audible in the music as surface noise, or in mixing and panning choices. In our messages to each other, we gave feedback about music, shared thoughts and feelings, frustrations, and joy. When I was remixing the final piece, Rast-panjgah, there were protests in Iran and the Iranian government shut down Telegram, an application that the population relies on to message each other like SMS. I mixed the rest of Rast-panjgah with a keen sense of Atefeh’s absence, and concern for Iran.

credits

released July 12, 2018

Composition 1
Flute improvisation and remix – Melanie Chilianis
Santoor performed and improvised in Segah Dastgah by Atefeh Einali

Dastgah drift
Composition by Atefeh Einali
Some sonic material generated by Melanie Chilianis
Flute – Melanie Chilianis | Santoor – Atefeh Einali

Chahargah
Flutes improvisation and composition – Melanie Chilianis
Santoor performed and improvised in Chahargah Dastgah by Atefeh Einali

Rast-panjgah
Santoor performed and improvised in Rast-Panjgah Dastgah by Atefeh Einali
Remix/production by Melanie Chilianis

Artwork by Gail Chilianis
Design by snoutling
Mastered by Maria Rice at Peerless Mastering, Boston, MA