Emilie Hope & Evangelina Telfar
The stage is washed with blue light. The lighting in this show is pretty simple, one I can’t help but think is not necessarily designed. The first half of the show has a simple blue wash, the second half a red wash. After the first song, Aftab has to ask the tech team to dim the house lights (the lights on the audience). “They’re beautiful but a little distracting,” she says. A strip of LED lights accompany the other rigged lights to add more blue or red to the stage. With a small amount of stage smoke catching the light, it does look cool. Anyway, lighting for this kind of show is not necessarily meant to knock our socks off, because the music does this thoroughly enough.
The show is an hour of Aftab with her mindbogglingly talented guitarist, Gyan Riley, and her supremely gifted double bassist, Petros Klampanis, performing the album Vulture Prince. This genre of music is classified as ‘global’ (only because it is not Western) but truly it is unclassifiable. Her music takes its lead from Sufi music, classical, jazz, minimalism, electronica, folk and probably more. Arooj’s music mixes an array of styles together to make something originally specific and poignant. It’s an hour of melancholy songs, and while I feel sad, it’s not quite that simple. The emotions are complex, but mostly I feel in awe of Aftab, of the band, of this music.
Aftab’s vocal ability is incredible. Some people say yodeling is hard, but microtonal singing, which Aftab does so beautifully, is harder. You are singing in between the notes of the Western musical scale. It takes skill and talent to sound as effortless as she does. Microtonal music is more common in Indian and Middle-Eastern music and also contemporary classical performance so this cross-over further speaks to Arooj’s specific musical journey. Aftab sings in Urdu. It’s truly a beautiful language. When she sings a song in English, the lyrics are simple but poetic. “My beloved was like the moon, and brighter than the sun.” This is from a longer song called Last Night and she sung a shorter version of it during the concert. Interestingly, it's the only song in English from the album.
During the concert she talks about her love of Fat Freddy’s Drop, asking if anyone in the audience can introduce her to the band members. From listening to her recorded music, it is clear that there are parallels between the two bands styles with the use of minimalism and jazz fusion, but her live performance is something different. She makes her music feel fresh through this performance and not like we are simply listening to her in the studio, recording this album. She adds a recorded soft percussive instrument into the live performance that comes and goes through each song that ties together the whole album. It’s soft rhythm doesn’t distract from the talent onstage but adds a level of peace and continuity to the whole night.
It’s clear these musicians understand one another. As they move through each song, they have a complete ease and cohesion as they perform each piece. It’s no surprise that they have been playing this music together for almost two years considering their level of comfort in these melodies. What is even more powerful, is that after all that time they still seem to each find new enjoyment in these pieces. Aftab describes her fellow musicians in the show as “rudely and offensively good” musicians. And that is not an exaggeration. They are insanely good, and you don’t have to know music to recognize it. This artistic trio will be playing this album for the last time on 23rd of March so the performance on the 13th of March is one of the final times they will play it, after playing it (probably) at least three times a week for about two years.
Aftab’s persona is cool, calm, and collected. Nothing seems to phase her, and the stage feels as comfortable to her as if it were her own lounge. In between songs, she says some words with deadpan humour, instantly making the audience laugh and winning us over. Dang, she’s cool. A vase of real roses sits on a round table on stage. At one point in the show, she explains that this is something she usually does in shows—throws roses to her audience. It can hurt (sometimes they have little thorns, like they do tonight—“Ouch!” she exclaims quietly), and though her lawyer warned her against it, she continues to do it. She explains the rules: there has to be eye contact, and the audience member has to enthusiastically agree to receiving the rose, then she throws, and the audience member catches. By the end of the show, all the roses have been given to various members of the audience. It goes down a treat. Historically, the crowd would give an artist roses, throwing them onstage at their feet, if they liked the show. There is something poetic about Aftab doing the reverse. I’m sure those audience members feel special walking away with their rose this night.
The encore is a song from her first album “which no one cares about but I like it.” If there is any more reason to like and respect this artist, here is another.
We are so lucky to have artists like Aftab grace our Te Whanganui-a-Tara stages, when usually a GRAMMY award winning artist may only visit Tāmaki Makaurau. Aotearoa New Zealand Festival of the Arts creates spaces for us to see artists like this and for that, we are grateful to them for a wonderful evening.
Arooj Aftab’s new album comes out next month (the title hasn’t been announced yet), so be sure to keep your ears out for it. Now excuse me while I find my socks.