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Flying Street, a musical conversation between Cairo and Montreal

Flying Street is a duet album that extends an ongoing musical and political conversation between Shalabi and Christof. It builds on a journey between Cairo and Montreal and a dialogue between the musicians related to their experiences working with grassroots arts and activists and a larger movement to overturn injustice. The album is a subtle, yet poignant reflection on identity, belonging, isolation, and seclusion as they merge between the foreground and the distance like a mirage cast by smoke, envisaged through the mirror of the mind's eye. Inherent in these recordings is an urgency to always question reality.

About the Artists:

Sam Shalabi is an Egyptian-Canadian composer, improviser and guitarist living between Montreal and Cairo. Starting out in punk rock in the late 70s, his work has evolved into a fusion of experimental, modern Arabic Music that incorporates traditional Arabic, shaabi, noise, classical, text, free improvisation and jazz. He has released five solo albums, five albums with Shalabi Effect, a free improvisation quartet that bridges western psychedelic music and Arabic Maqam and three albums with Land Of Kush, an experimental 30-member orchestra for which he composes. He has appeared on over 30 albums and toured Europe, North America and North Africa. Current projects include two albums on the Italian label Sagittarius, with Beirut, Turkish and Egyptian musicians and a recent tour in the eastern U.S with Alvarius B He premiered a new composition for oud and electronics in a series of performances in late 2014 and released an album with The Dwarves Of East Agouza, a Cairo-based trio with Maurice Louca and Alan Bishop. He is a founding member of Shalabi Effect and is currently working on the release of the sixth Shalabi Effect album.

Stefan Christoff is a Montreal-based writer, community organizer and musician. As a pianist, Stefan has worked on numerous projects, including "Duets for Abdelrazik", an album expressing solidarity with the struggle of Sudanese-Canadian Abousfian Abdelrazik who was exiled, jailed and tortured in Sudan with the active complicity of the Canadian government. Stefan worked also on a series of recordings at La Sala Rossa, including two albums of duets with Sam Shalabi on oud, the first "родина" and the second "Flying Street". Both are rooted in an evolving collaboration between Cairo and Montreal. Stefan has also released two EPs: "Temps libre", recorded in the context of the Quebec student strike with Brahja Waldman on saxophone and Peter Burton on bass; and "Wire Tones", recorded with double bass player David Parker in Kingston, Ontario at the Artel.