Interview by U.K.-based "Wheel Me Out" magazine
Unable to find an assessment of
Toronto-based John Kameel Farah's music that doesn't use odiously vague
terms like "cutting edge" and "genre-busting", Wheel Me Out thought JKF
might like to enlighten us in his own words. Classically trained,
sonically obsessed and at a cultural crossroads, he reluctantly offered
"Postmodern... but after that." by Ted Niles
5/5 stars
"Celebrated Canadian pianist John Farah has been fusing electronic
beats with future
jazz and classical composition since 2005. Trip-hop, drum'n'bass and
experimental
electronica enthusiasts will be floored by Farah's seamless mastery of
the myriad sonic layers here:
percussive elements, keys, synthesizers, Amen breaks and soft jazz
chords intermingle
in a breathtakingly complex dance. Whether drawing from breakcore and
dubstep, North Indian
modal traditions or abstract baroque compositions, Farah's music works
on a dizzying
array of levels and will astonish chin-stroking jazz nerds, brain dead
bass-heads
and those seeking the coolest new background music. Incomparable."
-Steve Lalla, Hour Magazine
(Montreal) 5/5
Review
of Unfolding
in CueMix
Magazine (Germany)
A review from MusicMachinist
(Russia) - read the english translation here
Review
of Unfolding in Wholenote, Toronto's Classical magazine
"Orchestrating
Ephiphanies": in Montréal's Hour Magazine, Sept 18, 2009
Toronto-based pianist and composer John
Kameel Farah stunned the world with the release of his achingly
emotive and infinitely intricate sophomore album Unfolding
earlier this year. Drawing on influences from his background in
classical, jazz, Arabic music and free improvisation, and expertly
seasoning them with peerless electronic drum programming, Farah is
breaking down barriers towards creating a more natural and intuitive
musical dialogue between man and his technology. With Unfolding he has completely rewritten the
rulebook,
producing a labyrinthine soundscape of such dizzying colours, depths
and sonorities that it can't be called jazz, modern classical or fusion
any easier than it could be labelled
drum'n'bass or IDM. Without the support of a major label or
orchestra, and working with the same limitations
of space, time and money that afflict our most challenging artists,
Farah took incredible risks to realize the album. Read
the complete article HERE
Describing this disc as a combination
of jazz and drum ’n’ bass is accurate but extremely misleading.
No, this is not laid-back coffee shop
breaks with lukewarm horn solos tacked on top,
and you’re probably never going to
hear these tracks DJed in some cheesy lounge....
The result is a remarkably successful
combination of computer music and live musicianship,
and manages to sound unlike pretty
much anything else out there.
-Benjamin
Boles, NOW Magazine, NNNN
With Unfolding, Farah concentrates all his diverse
energies into
one powerful statement.
Actually describing what's happening is a hell of a lot more
challenging than listening to these
waterfall-like cascades of sounds... It's simply impossible to
imagine what's going to happen next....
Eleven-minute epic closer "Cataclysm" has several pile driving false
endings that represent
the furthest extremity of this maximalist work. -David
Dacks,
Exclaim Magazine, August, 2009
Hour Magazine: Farah brings stunning sonic,
compositional and manual dexterity to Montréal's Centre St
Ambroise
'Acid-dream skating'
John Kameel Farah bringing his eclectic brand of music to Natrel
Rink
By ERROL NAZARETH, Toronto SUN
Hamburg
Express, Germany, writes about Farah's 2007 tour
David
Dacks writes in depth about John Farah's instrumentation in the "WHAT I
PLAY" section of EXCLAIM!
Magazine
"...John Kameel Farah isn’t a “lapsed” classicist; he keeps
building on everything that came before... he has found numerous ways
to incorporate his education into bold and uncategorisable musical
activity... Any investigation of what Farah plays quickly raises
questions about how he plays and in essence, how he
thinks...." Click
here to read the full article
"The
music of Toronto’s John Kameel Farah reaches far and wide"
July 27, 2007 Rupert Bottenberg, MONTRÉAL MIRROR
"...His work speaks of the ancient past and unperceivable future, the
micro and the macro, antibodies and heavenly bodies and astral
bodies..."
CLICK
here to read the full article
Breaking
the sound barrier
: John Kameel Farah is redefining electronica...
Jul 05, 2007 John Terauds, Classical Music Critic, TORONTO STAR
"...a force connected to the living, breathing, cutting edge of
music... Performer-composer John Kameel Farah, 34, is bravely,
imaginatively
forging new sonic ideas at the remote point where the starchy concert
hall and glistening-chested dance club could possibly intersect.
His barrier-busting mix of electronic, acoustic composition and
improvisation contains everything from early Middle Eastern and Western
Baroque to 20th-century serialism and minimalism, as well as the deep,
complex percussion loops of the dance floor.
It's a crazy mix. But it has the power to mesmerize even listeners who
have no idea about the complex theories behind how these sound waves
came to be..." (cont'd...)
CLICK
here to read the full article
NOW
Magazine Toronto - Best of Toronto 2006
Best Pianist - JOHN KAMEEL FARAH
"Farah occupies a fairly
idiosyncratic
(and possibly lonely) place as a
keyboard player. He's classically trained and technically proficient,
but also steeped in experimental improvisation, and he consciously
integrates non-Western traditions and ideas while also freely borrowing
from electronic dance music. Not many would try to play cascading
harpsichord figures over top of skittish experimental drum 'n' bass
rhythms, but we're glad he does, as few others have the chops or the
creativity to pull it off."
The Toronto Star on CREATION:
"Toronto composer/keyboardist John
Kameel Farah crosses genres and breaks down traditional boundaries with
this electronic-inspired
invention. He plans and
improvises in equal measure. He interweaves acoustic and
synthetic.
He is equally comfortable on the
dance floors of the 16th and 21st
centuries. Here, in 21
seamless tracks, Farah takes us on an entrancing,
beat-loop-powered tour of our
interior cultural-musical psyche. My two favourite tracks (the
nine-minute "Fantasie and
Toccata") introduce the music of William
Byrd to the synthesizer and
sequencer. Long live the mash-up."
-John Terauds, TORONTO STAR, July
27, 2006, (3.5/4 stars)
JOHN
KAMEEL FARAH Creation (independent) Rating: NNNN
"Ideally, all musicians' influences
would be as diverse as the sonic
world John Kameel Farah inhabits. It can be tough trying to combine
your various loves into a sound that actually makes sense, and most
artists choose to focus on one style at a time. When someone actually
combines the elements of their musical history without making them
sound like a bunch of empty references, the results are genuinely
exciting. A skilled classically trained piano player, Farah also
dabbles in modern improvised music, as well as dance and experimental
electronic music. This isn't the type of crossover stuff that's going
to be rocking dance floors any time soon, but he links his various
ideas and tangents in many ways like a DJ set, with interludes joining
the tracks and a real sense of a journey emerging over the album's
length."
-Benjamin Boles, NOW Magazine, Toronto,
Sept. 21, 2006
"If your word of the day calendar gave you polymath
today, it might also include a photo, or even better, an mp3 file from John Kameel Farah.
Like a musical super virus, the definition resistant Farah can't be
contained. He bursts into many of Toronto's bubble-like music
communities, drawing from baroque, jazz, hip hop, classical,
drum&bass and Arabic practices and merging them all into a very
personal web of unlikely connections. Avant-garde? Yes. Hoity-toity?
No. And if you check out Sunday's concert with TASA,
you'll also see what happens when his creativity spills over into visual art."
Tori Allen, CBC Metro Morning:
What's Goin' On This Week, Jan 26, 2007
OTTAWA
CITIZEN: Farah in Key, by Fateema
Sayani
Toronto piano guy John Kameel Farah counts himself lucky to have been
reviewed by the Toronto Star's classical critic one day, played an
avant-garde jazz fest the next, then an underground electronica event a
few days later. Those diverse interests converge on his debut CD,
Creation, which is heavy on experimentation while still having a
palpable pop bent. When attached to Farah, the word "experimentation"
isn't synonymous with atonal drones. A childhood piano master, he moves
from classical piano to Middle Eastern textures to trip hop. The fusing
is relatively seamless on disc. So just how does he translate the aural
goulash on stage? "It's halfway between a formal concert experience and
an underground drum 'n' bass DJ set," he says. Farah -- a one-man
beat-slinging post-orchestra -- will lug a Fender Rhodes electric
piano, synthesizer, laptop and harpsichord to town for his first Ottawa
show, playing two sets. "Each set is like a giant composition," he
says. "The structure is really large with lots of mini-structures
inside it. It appeals to people's imaginations: they don't have to
understand what's going on theoretically, they just enjoy this big
trip."
CREATION review in WHOLENOTE
(monthly classical music publication):
Classically trained pianist and composer, Toronto-based Farah's CD
"Creation" is an extraordinary self-produced musical journey which
literally merges music from the 16th century to today's techno dance
floors. It is all performed with style and assuredness by the composer
on acoustic piano, harpsichord and various synthesizers and samplers.
Above all, it is evident that here we have the sure hand of a composer
with something to say. Farah's command of his instruments and aesthetic
direction allows him to superimpose Renaissance European dance music on
top of current synthesized dance beats (or perhaps the other way
around), while evoking 1950-70s electronic analogue synth sounds, all
mediated by minimalist patterns of the Reich kind. At other moments,
such as on the luteniste, de-tuned synth keyboard melodies cleverly
elicit a Middle Eastern sound world. The sequence of the individual
pieces is satisfyingly modulated and
reminds this listener of the younger John Oswald's sense of adventurous
musical form.
According to those who know the dance music scene better than I (a sad
admission since one of my sons is a Hiphop DJ), the ordering of pieces
on this CD is similar to a dance DJ set and replicates Farah's live
concerts. Short interludes played on honestly-recorded acoustic piano
and harpsichord add to the sense of a sonic grand tour - taking place
over time and world geography - which emerges over the duration of
"Creation".
John Kameel Farah's first CD is an auspicious and confident
genre-busting and ear-opening mix. I for one eagerly await the next leg
of his musical journey.
by Andrew Timar, Wholenote
Magazine, Sept, 2007
Article
in the Brampton Guardian about Mary Anne and John Farah's
brother-sister duo Art Exhibition at Beaux-Arts Brampton Gallery
Click
here to read
Montréal Mirror on John Farah and Eric Shinn's "Montréal
World Tour" Dec. 15,16,17, 2006:
"ALCHEMICAL BROTHER: Eastern and
Western, traditional and avant-garde, electronic and acoustic - to
Toronto composer/performer John Kameel Farah, these are all puzzle
pieces to be arranged, rearranged and deranged to create fascinating
new permutations of music. Hear it all happen when Farah joins Eric
Shinn and Mitchell
Akiyama for an evening called
Alchemy Organum, a mix of keys, computers and archaic tech..."
-Rupert Bottenberg, MIRROR Magazine, Dec. 14, 2006.
CBC interview on
the Arts Tonight May 2005
Eleanor Wachtel interviews John Dubinski and John Farah about GRAVITAS
On music for GRAVITAS DVD
"...a trance-inducing landscape
inspired by the vast history of music, from 16th-century English
pavanes, to
techno, to traditional Arab
influences. The
interaction of looped beats and repeating sound samples has the power
to pull us out of
ourselves - a measure of great music. ...For Farah, it's a quest
to
understand how and why the world is as it
is. And the insights he gleans are
channelled right into his soundscapes. 'Maybe the only truth I can
express is in music,' he says.
To do this with sounds... that appeal to club kids and new music fans
equally is a major achievement."
-John Terauds, TORONTO STAR, Mar
9, 2006
NUIT
BLANCHE at Grange Park
"This local pianist [John Farah], electronic composer and
skilled
improviser with a strong experimental bent combines ideas and sounds
from his classical background with contemporary electronic dance music.
However, given the nature of the event, it's likely that the
drum'n'bass rhythms will stay at home in favour of a lighter, more
delicate
set."
-Benjamin
Boles, NOW Magazine, Toronto,
Sept 28, 2006
Beats
per Week - DB'S BEST BETS
"Toronto composer John Kameel Farah has an enterprising musical mind,
one equally attuned to contemporary art music and drum & bass,
ambient atonality and rip-roaring beats. Here, in a two-hour showcase
he describes as 'somewhere between a solo piano concert and a techno
event,' Farah improvises on piano, computer and synth."
-Denise
Benson, DB'S
Best Bets, EYE WEEKLY, April
22, 2004
On
music for GRAVITAS DVD
"In the 45-minute work, local composer John Kameel Farah's
ingenious,
Autechre-like score accompanies animations generated by John Dubinski
on a supercomputer... go to the Music Gallery to hear Farah's
interpretation of Kepler's Music of the Spheres, conveniently shortened
from 30 years to 30 minutes in duration. Damn, this science is too
tight."
-Jason
Anderson, EYE Weekly, March 9, 2006
NOW
Magazine's review of Dubinski & Farah's GRAVITAS DVD by
Jason Richards, Mar 9, 2006
Creation - John Kameel Farah
"Skilled
pianist and electronic music composer John Kameel Farah introduces you
to his unusual world with 20 instrumental cuts exploring traditional
Eastern and Western music, improvisation and contemporary ambient, IDM
and d'n'b sounds. A challenging listen, the unique nature of Farah's
style draws from influences as disparate as Aphex Twin and Squarepusher
to Schoenberg or Keith Jarrett... the album's mood quickly fluctuates
from a lullaby to frantic orchestral drill'n'bass. All of this makes
Farah stand out, and one can look forward to the development of his
potential."
-Steve Lalla, HOUR Magazine,
Montreal, November 16th, 2006
EXTENDED
PLAY. "Droppin' science" promo for GRAVITAS
by Denise Benson, EYE Weekly, Oct 13, 2005
Dance
Review on body geometry: the 7th angel, EYE
Weekly, Dec13-19, 2001
Dance
Review on body geometry: the 7th angel,
NOW Magazine, Dec13-19, 2001