Eliyahu Sills Music 
Eliyahu & The Quadim Ensemble : Eastern Wind (US,2009)***°
featuring Rachel Valfer & Faisal Zedan
What I didn’t hear before was the link between different sorts of songs and traditions from the whole middle east. Bit Eliyahu with The Quadim Ensemble make this link sound obvious and spontaneous, as if improvised on the spot. A few tracks have extra North-African flavours. The tracks, -devotional songs, love songs and folk tunes-, are from Jewish (17th century), Armenian, Turkish, Jewish Moroccan, self-penned or Egyptian in origin. The percussion sounds rather Persian. Also included is oud (mostly, but also saz) and flute (Sufi flute but also Indian bamboo flute). The sound is warm and enjoyable, and shows a vision in how to make this tradition sound attractive and most acceptable for a western public without long lengths (something which can sound great too if you once experienced original traditional performances live before).
