Певица Бахар Мовахед исполняет поэмы Руми на персидском языке с использованием запрещенных ранее музыкальных ладов

Iranian-born, California-based singer Bahar Movahed is rooted in the traditions of Persian classical music, having studied with master practitioners in Tehran. On this follow-up to her 2012 debut, Goblet of Eternal Light, she dives deep, singing in her native Farsi for the first time and setting poems by Rumi and others to arrangements by Iranian composer Navid Dehghan. Many of Dehghan’s pieces are played by his 14-piece Ghamar Ensemble, rendered with brio by the swooping strings and hand percussion associated with classical and popular traditions across North Africa and Southwest Asia. But it’s the quieter, more spacious pieces that really beguile, with Movahed’s languorous vocals entwining with Dehghan’s bowed kamancheh and Alireza Geranfar’s santour. There’s a subtle radicalism at work too, with Movahed seizing the opportunity to sing in Rast-Panjah, one of the most challenging modes in Persian music, formerly denied to her as a female artist in Iran. It’s utterly spellbinding.