Cities And Memory

The original sound source for this composition is a selection of Nuristani songs. The voice is accompanied by a plucked and bowed string instrument as a type of rhythmic drone. This recording is a recently rediscovered item in the Pitt Rivers sound museum and I was drawn to it based on its historical and tonal ambiguity. I find it interesting that the library information is not able to give an exact date for the recording, and it could have been recorded in either 1954, 1964, or 1970. There seems to be many conflicting theories about the "origins" of the people residing in the Nuristani area, however due to the more recent introduction of Islam, their pre-Islamic rites, religion and rituals are still strong. The language that the songs are recited in attracted me as it did not sound like the main current language used in that region. As a young child I lived in the north west of Iran which is not far from Afghanistan and remember those years as a profoundly simple, dream-like and creatively rich source of my