The debut of the duo Damāvand (Gianluca Ceccarini and Alessandro Ciccarelli), a tribute to the 18th Century Armenian poet and musician Sayat Nova, weaves a sprawling sense of rhythmic abstraction from ancient poetic touchstone, offering further proof that the future of ambient music is now.
As Long As You Come To My Garden is a tribute to the Armenian troubadour Sayat Nova, through his lyrics and freely inspired by the cult movie about his life: "The color of the pomegranates" (Nrran Guyny, 1968, USSR) directed by Sergei Parajanov.
The feature film tells the life of the poet, who lived in the eighteenth century, from childhood in the royal court, to retirement until his death in the monastery of Haghpat, through a series of episodes, static like paintings that do not tell but show, evoke, they suggest through metaphors, analogies, surrealist flair, dreamlike landscapes, liturgical pauses.
The six tracks are inspired by the dreamlike imagery contained in the movie, weaving sound textures ranging from ambient to noise, to references to the musical tradition of the Middle East. Gianluca Ceccarini and Alessandro Ciccarelli alternate, without fixed roles, with analog synths, drones, amplified common objects, generative music, audio samples from the film and acoustic instruments such as the tar, a stringed instrument of Persian origin, the trombone and the cornet. In addition, two of the songs on the album contain Sayat Nova's poems recited in Persian by Nahid Rezashateri.
The sound materials are revealed gradually like episodes, evoking the visual suggestions staged by Parajanov in the film. As Long As You Come To My Garden is intended as an imaginative journey to distant spaces and indefinite archaic times.
Limited edition of 300 copies.
Damāvand is a musical project by Italian artists and musicians Gianluca Ceccarini (electronics, electroacoustic objects, tar) and Alessandro Ciccarelli (electronics, electroacoustic objects, trombone, cornet).
Gianluca Ceccarini is a guitarist, electroacoustic experimentalist, and luthier who specializes in the restoration and construction of stringed early music instruments. He also works in photographic research, video-art, graphics and independent publishing with the Sarab collective.
Alessandro Ciccarelli is an author and artist working with different languages: photography, video, and sound. He is involved in several collective research projects in the musical and theatrical fields. His solo records are released under the moniker Elnath.
