Alya Al-Sultani, Pat Thomas, Khabat Abas

Manara is a trio that emerged from a love of poetry, a shared interest in the musical traditions of the Middle East and poetry as political resistance. The musicians had worked together before separately – Alya and Khabat performed together in Suleimaniyah, Iraqi Kurdistan as part of the Space 21 Festival, and Alya and Pat have improvised together in several ensembles over the past decade.

Alya had arrived at a time where she was desperate to explore the performance of more poetry in her mother tongue – she wanted to find a vehicle for free improvisation that was not orientalised and captured the complexity of the identity of exiled individuals and those who think and feel differently to their surroundings. Having always admired and loved Pat and Khabat’s work, she believed that coming together would achieve that sound. In the tradition of classical Middle Eastern music, the compositions start with a poem placed into the hands of a singer.