Mathias Duplessy & Mukhtiyar Ali: From Asian deserts to Andalusia

Collaborations between the east and west such as Zakir and McLaughlin, Ravi Shankar and Yehudi Menuhin, have resulted in some of the finest music over the decades. Mathias Duplessy from France started working with the Sufi Indian singer Mir Mukhtiyar Ali six years ago and soon realised they had a common language in music. They evolved a style of their own, which was inspired by Rajasthani folk, flamenco, blues, reggae, African, Japanese and Mongolian music. In 2011, they recorded an album in Paris called “Jeena Jeena” and have been performing since with the great Bastien Charlery, accordion player from the Bulgarian gypsy style. The famous sarangi player Sabir Khan who works with them on film scores will also join the stage for an exceptional evening!

Mathias Duplessy

Difficult to label him, he plays dozens of instruments and loves the strings. Mathias Duplessy belongs to the generation of musicians who do not like borders; and approaches world music without any complex. From a song to a solo guitar suite or strings adagio, his music conveys the big spaces and the time passing.
Between flamenco, oriental, classical music or gypsy jazz, his style is unique and full of energy. Joyful, generous, Mathias has a lot of projects following his music encounters and composes music for films in France, Morocco and India (Peepli Live, Finding Fanny).

Mukhtiyar Ali

He comes from the semi-nomadic community called Mirasi from the Thar desert. He lives in Pugal, a village at the border of Pakistan and Rajasthan. He belongs to the 26th generation of this community which has successfully kept alive the oral tradition Sufiana Qalam.
Mukhtiyar Ali has a voice which can only be experienced. He has preserved the ideology of Sufiana music which impels divine communion with an ecstasy created in total detachment. He pervades this very essence of Sufiana Qalam with his involvement not just in the music but also in its poetry.
Today, while singing Sufi poetry all over the country with his original compositions, he’s also regularly called in to Bombay to work on film background scores and tours abroad with his Jeena Jeena team.

source: http://www.bluefrog.co.in / Events / February 15th 2015 – Mumbai /