"The
Psalms of RA" is an acoustic ritual of neo-ancient music
recorded at the world famous scoring studios of Skywalker Sound.
Skywalker has recorded the soundtracks to countless Hollywood films,
as well as many of the greatest musicians of our time. Now, through
Skywalkers support and the collaborative efforts of nearly
fifty musicians with diverse ethnic backgrounds, a unique and timely
project has been brought to life.
The Psalms of RA is a symbolic journey through the passage
of a full day. From sunrise to sunset to sunrise again, the recordings
move the listener through time, from birth to life to death to rebirth.
Most of the texts are either in ancient Egyptian or Aramaic Hebrew,
and many are derived from Egyptian Book of Coming Forth into Day,
otherwise known as The Book of the Dead. Hebrew texts (on the double
CD only) have been referenced from the Biblical Book of Psalms,
and from traditional prayers. The newest version of "The Psalms
of RA", featuring only the Egyptian related music and accompanied
by a 48 page book, has been specially designed for museum shops
and those with a particular interest in Egyptology.
The
Psalms of RA is the brainchild of world musician/composer
Jim Berenholtz. Over
the past two decades he has made five visits to Egypt, as well as
repeated visits to Israel, Palestine, Jordan, Sudan, Ethiopia, Iran,
Turkey and Lebanon. During those journeys he has meditated, chanted,
prayed and played flute in the ancient temples along the Nile, in
remote desert shrines, in canyons and dunes, along the beaches of
the Red Sea and atop the mountains of Sinai. From these hallowed
places have come many melodies and songs, composed to the words
of ancient texts in the original languages. Unique orchestrations
combine Western symphonic instruments with traditional Near Eastern
winds, strings and percussion. The result is the feeling of being
beneath the brilliant starry sky of a Saharan night, or witnessing
the glory of sunrise from the inner sanctum of a temple. Thus listeners
are taken on an inner spiritual journey that is both healing and
life-affirming.
The revolutionary pharaoh Akhenaten, with his mystical philosophy
of solar light, is a particularly important poetic source for
The Psalms of RA project. The story of his role in the
making of the CD is fascinating. Akhenatens 3,500 year old
Hymn to the Sun, although translated in numerous languages as one
of the most famous of all ancient Egyptian texts, had never been
assembled in a complete transliteration (phonetic pronunciation)
prior to this recording. However, after months of searching the
composer was finally able to locate the renowned Egyptologist William
Murnane. An expert on the Akhenaten/Amarna period, he had already
worked out the pronunciations of the Hymn to the Sun text from the
original hieroglyphic stone slab. He agreed to compile his notes
into a finished document, and also provided a recording of his voice
speaking the text to assist with the pronunciations. Two months
later, professor Murnane died of a sudden heart attack. Yet in knowing
that the centerpiece of his work did not die with him, there is
some consolation. Indeed, at the core of The Psalms of RA
project is the desire to allow ancient, ancestral voices to be heard
again.
Significantly, the Hymn to the Sun is not the only work on the CD
that was born from death. The composers parents died within
nine months of each other, and it was shortly after
this period that he set the traditional Jewish mourners prayer,
known as the Kaddish, to his own new music. Psalm 116, which speaks
of being spiritually uplifted after hitting lifes bottom,
was also composed at that time, as was the music for an ancient
Sumerian ritual chant from the Epic of Gilgamesh about the goddess
of the underworld.
Related to the Egyptian Hymn to the Sun on the recording is the
Hebrew Psalm 104. It is an exquisite poetic text celebrating the
forces of nature, and is considered by many Biblical scholars to
have been inspired by Akhenatens earlier hymn. This Hebrew/Egyptian
connection is a theme that runs throughout the double CD set. Too
often it is the negative side of the relationship between these
two cultures that has been emphasized. Yet the Jews lived in ancient
Egypt for a thousand years. As civilizations living side by side,
there was much creative and spiritual cross-fertilization. Moses,
a high initiate of the Egyptian priesthood and schools of magic,
is but one example of that cultural interaction. The Psalms
of RA dares to celebrate this, interweaving Kabbalistic Hebrew
incantations with Egyptian ritual mantras, reaching for the very
origins of language that can be found in root words and syllables.
In Psalm 133 this finds a more contemporary and politically relevant
expression by taking the traditional Hebrew folk song which comes
from this psalm and performing it in both Hebrew and Arabic. The
arrangement was worked out by Near Eastern ethnomusicologist Jihad
Racy, composer of the soundtrack for the famous Tutankhamun exhibit
that toured North America in 1978. It is performed by him with fellow
Lebanese and Palestinian musicians, together with singers of Jewish
and Christian background. It is, in no uncertain terms, a call for
unity and peace.
Add
to this cultural/linguistic mix the texts, songs and sounds of African
cultures like the Borana, the music of West Asian cultures like
the Persian, and you have The Psalms of RA. The world
music influences are especially apparent through the use of traditional
North African and Middle Eastern instruments like nai flutes, dumbek
drums, sistrums, bells, gongs, fanfare trumpets, santur, oud, guitar
and harp. These are combined with orchestral woodwinds, brass, strings,
and percussion, reflecting the classical European musical influences
in the project. Members of the San Francisco Symphony, Ballet and
Opera Orchestras are among the featured instrumentalists on the
CD.
As for the vocal music, it is both solo and choral. Often it aims
towards the kind of vocal resonance in recording that occurs naturally
when chanting within the stone block walls of the temples. For example,
in Pyramid of Light the audio space was precisely designed by recording
and mixing engineer Aaron Reiff to simulate the acoustical properties
of the Kings Chamber inside the Great Pyramid of Giza.
Certainly the musical sources of inspiration for The Psalms
of RA are eclectic. Still, the resulting music has a distinct
and consistent style of its own. It has been conceived as a new
kind of music which the composer calls Neo-Ancient,
bringing contemporary classical and world music together.
Ultimately,
The Psalms of RA is intended as a creative contribution
for peace, particularly in the Middle East. By interweaving the
musical and linguistic roots of peoples that have long been held
hostage to nationalistic and fundamentalist ideologies, The
Psalms of RA aims towards a celebration of a shared spiritual
heritage that transcends political differences. It has always been
the role of the arts to awaken and illuminate, and for artists to
take the lead in forging ahead where others dare not tread. Citizen
diplomacy is the forerunner of true political change, and music,
the universal language, is one of the most effective and wonderful
ways that the citizens of the world can reach out to each other.
*
In 2004 "The Psalms of RA" was nominated as "Best
Middle Eastern Album of the Year" by the "Just Plain Folks"
Independent Music Awards. Thru May, 2005, the music played in the
Treasures of Tutankhamun exhibition at the Kunsthalle (National
Art Museum) in Bonn, Germany. There it formed the soundtrack of
a repeating 22 minute computer animated film entitled "Die
GrÃ?ber der Pharaonen" (The Tombs of the Pharoahs).
Thru February 2006, "The Psalms of RA" is the soundtrack
for the audio tour of the landmark exhibition "Hatshepsut -
from Queen to Pharoah" at the new de Young Art Museum in San
Francisco.
|