Remix ⟷ Culture

Tanfis
Artistic Discipline: Music
Category: Brooklyn Arts Fund
Grant Year: 2023
Location: Bay Ridge
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The "Tanfis" project is a series of multidisciplinary works based on the theme of tanfis (cartharsis), developed as a conversation between SWANA-rooted traditional music and the audio/visual/textual remix of this heritage. This chapter of the Tanfis series will focus on Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, a neighborhood often referred to as Little Palestine. This project will be based around music of the Levant region (Palestine, Lebanon, and Syria). The project will be facilitated by Remix ⟷ Culture Founder Hatim Belyamani, and will feature several Bay Ridge-based music-makers. These musicians will collaboratively create a new evening-length work that weaves together traditional music of the Levant with the spirit of remix. This process consists of: gathering oral histories, filming/recording traditional musicians, and synthesizing these elements into a concert-length work. This will culminate in a performance at a local venue. We believe this project serves as a counterweight to rising waves of discrimination and violence against SWANA folks locally and nationally. These events will amplify the Arab voices of Bay Ridge, and attract audiences from around the city. By remixing stories both of oppression and the tanfis of liberation, we can reconnect with one another and breathe new life into our ancestral lineages.