Interview with Elaheh Khaki

Elaheh Khaki's piece 'Our Fragmentary Survival' is part of our New Works programming.

You can hear her piece on Wednesday September 10th at 7pm or Tuesday September 23 at 7:00pm by tuning in to 106.5 FM (Gatineau) or by listening online.

Learn more about her piece and her process through this interview.

1.You have been working with the words of an Iranian revolutionary poem, ‘If I Rise’ by Hamid Mosaddegh. Could you translate the poem for us?

Track 1 - Silence Breathes Backwards

With you now

What forgetfulnesses (1)

With me now what sittings,

What silences 

With you

With you

With you

(And then the use of intelligible Persian phrases, which are reversed recordings of the same words and verses used in the song, gradually increases toward the end of the song)

(1) In Persian, we can use the plural form of this word, which is why I added an “s,” even though I know it doesn’t make sense in English.

Track 2 - Meadows Call, Mountains Sing

The meadows call your name

The mountains recite my poem

If I do not become we, I am alone

If you do not become we, you are only yourself

If I sit still

If you sit still

Who will rise?

Track 3 - Who Knows, Maybe Hope

[1st part: Who knows]

It is not of my affection and your cruelty we speak

It is of a friendship breaking apart 

Meeting with passion 

Parting with pain 

Meeting with passion 

Parting with pain

[2nd part: Maybe Hope]

Who is to say that you and I

Shall not once more

Raise the passion of unity

Who is to say that you and I

Shall not once more

Raise the passion of unity In the East, again

Again to rise 

Who is to say that you and I

Who is to say that you and I

The passion of unity

The passion of unity

The passion of unity

Of unity

In the East

Track 4 - Echo to Silence

This track reworks the material of Track 1, using the same lyrics but reshaped as a musical response by Alireza Hezaryan.

2. How did you work with this poem, with instruments, with your voice, and with collaborators to create this piece?

A few months ago, I posted on my Instagram story that I was searching for collaborators for an experimental project based on a Persian poem. I explained that I was working with improvisations shaped by fragments of the poem. As a pianist-composer, I hoped to connect with vocalists, guitarists, cellists, and recording or mastering engineers. Yet I received only a handful of responses, most from people living outside my city, Ottawa. The lack of access to like-minded musicians who were open to experimentation nearly made me give up on the project, since developing an improvisatory and conceptual piece is difficult without being in the same room.

However, when I saw Radio-Hull’s call for original projects, I decided to record “a version” of this project by whatever means possible, so it could be more easily shared with other musicians and heard by more people. Alireza Hezaryan was one of the encouraging respondents I came to know through this project. After sharing the vocal and piano stems of Track 1 with Alireza, I invited him to create the atmosphere he felt while listening. He recorded the guitar lines and chose to abandon the reversed piano audio, which I had initially explained as representing movement back through history. Instead, Alireza created forward-moving lines that I interpret as a mirror of hope. Our collaboration took place online, as he is based in Alberta.

3. When you listen back to the work, what comes up for you?

I had to be a one-woman show for this project, not because I wanted to, but because I didn’t really have access to anyone but myself. The first three tracks rely solely on two core instruments: a piano that’s over 100 years old, and the voice of a pianist who’s shy to sing! Neither was meant to be professionally recorded, but both carried something that needed to be shared.

Looking back now, I feel proud and happy, since I had about three weeks to put everything together while also figuring out recording and mastering along the way. I’m so grateful to the Radio-Hull team, because without their kind encouragement and their generosity in lending me equipment, this project wouldn’t have been possible.

If I had more time and resources, I would expand this project into something larger. I would produce more of the parts I’ve already composed, bring in more singers — Iranian and non-Iranian — with different voice colours for the tracks where hope should sound fuller. I would also write verses and versions for Francophone and Anglophone singers and include a variety of languages in the EP — something I’ve always wanted to do. There’s so much that could be done… maybe next time!