Raqs Nouveau Musicians
Georges Lammam (Music Director, violin)
Georges Lammam is of Palestinian descent, born in Beirut, Lebanon and living for 14 years in the
United Arab Emirates. He is well-known in the Middle East and the United States as a solo violinist
exemplifying the Arab style of instrumental improvisation and lyricism. Currently living in San
Francisco, California, he co-founded Amorfia Productions to proliferate Arabic arts in the West.
He is artistic director of The Georges Lammam Ensemble that tours nationally and has performed at the
San Francisco World Music Festival, The Legion of Honor Museum during the Eternal Egypt Exhibit,
for special exhibits at The De Young Museum in San Francisco and The Fine Arts Cinema in Berkeley,
presenting live, an original score for the 1926 silent animated classic film from Germany, The
Adventures of Prince Ahmed.
During the First International Conference on Middle Eastern Dance at Orange Coast College in Southern
California, he headlined with international dance stars, Mona el Said from Egypt and Amani, from
Lebanon. For seven seasons, Mr. Lammam has been music director for the Jawaahir Dance Company
concert season. As a solo artist, he performed his original score for “Blood Relative,” a timely play
directed by Aaron Davidman with the Traveling Jewish Theater in San Francisco, California.
Mr. Lammam is an instructor of violin and Arabic singing at the annual Middle Eastern Music and
Dance Camp in Mendocino, California and has taught Arabic music ensemble and vocal classes at the
University of California at Berkeley, Humboldt State University, Santa Fe College, and Middlebury
College in Vermont.
In addition to his own discography, Mr. Lammam records as a featured artist with two notable fusion
groups, Shabaz and Ancient Future and has performed in a select ensemble under the direction of
Mickey Hart. “Dreaming the Diaspora,” is his latest recording of original music fusing Eastern and
Western musical sensibilities.
Scott Davies (guitar)
Scott Mateo Davies began studying guitar at age nine. Upon completing high school, he traveled
extensively for four years, performing as a folk singer in diverse venues in London, Casablanca,
Stockholm, and New Delhi. After returning to Minneapolis, Davies founded the pop group The Rogues,
touring the Midwest for 11 years. While on the road, he began playing classical guitar. In 1982, he
moved to Madrid, where he began intensively studying flamenco guitar. From 1986 to 1998 Davies was
the featured guitarist and oud player for Voices of Sepharad, a group dedicated to performing music and
dance of the Spanish Jewish diaspora. In May of 1995, Voices of Sepharad received the prestigious
Robert and Adelle S. Blank Jewish Arts Award in New York.
In 2000 he created “RaiAction,” a seven-member ensemble performing flamenco-influenced North
African Rai music. Davies also performs regularly at school assemblies, workshops, and residencies.
Salah Abdel Fattah (violin)
Salah Abdel Fattah is a native of Egypt. He has played violin with Cairo University and recorded for
television in the sixties. He co-founded Layalli Sharque, the twin cities finest Arabic ensemble, where he
continues to play. He also performs with Amwaaj, a classical Arabic ensemble. Salah is the musical
director of Belahdaan, an Arabic weekly public television show. He has studied with Simon Shaheen at
the Arabic Music retreat where he attended every year since 1998.
Laura Harada (violin)
Laura Harada has been studying and performing classical Arabic music since 1997, when she first met
and studied with Palestinian oud and violin virtuoso, Simon Shaheen. Originally trained in western
classical music, she fell in love with the rich tonal language and rhythms of Arabic music and has been
pursuing further study and performance ever since. Laura has attended the Arabic Music Retreat (AMR)
for eight years and studied for five weeks with Simon Shaheen in NYC. Laura has performed for several
Jawaahir Dance Company productions. In 2005, she toured with Youssou N’Dour as part of Fathy
Salama’s Cairo Orchestra. Laura currently performs with Amwaaj, Music Mundial, and Batucada do
Norte and frequently collaborates with In the Heart of the Beast Puppet and Mask Theatre.
Miles Jay (bass)
Miles Jay’s strong musical foundation in jazz and classical music, combined with his extensive
performance experience in the musical traditions of the Middle East, have made him one of the most
uniquely qualified double bassists in the world music scene today. His performance experience has
taken him around the world, from Cairo to Oslo, Dubai to Dakar, Carnegie Hall to the Kennedy Center.
These performance credits include Youssou N’Dour, Fathy Salama, Naser Shama (Iraq), the Cairo
Symphony Orchestra, Ross Daly (Greece), Omar Faruk Tekbilek, and “Weird” Al Yankovic.
In 2002 Miles joined the touring ensemble of Lebanese violinist Georges Lammam, beginning his
professional performance experience in Arabic Music. In 2004 he graduated from the University of
California, Santa Barbara, where he received a BA in Ethnomusicology, and then moved to Cairo. In the
2 1/2 years he lived in there, Miles worked full time with numerous local and international artists in
musical styles including traditional Nubian/Sudanese, political theater, cabaret, and Arabic jazz. In order
to bring these influences to the double bass, he is working to develop a more fluid arco technique,
allowing him to express the subtle nuances and minute intonation found in these traditions.
Elias Lammam (accordion)
Elias Lammam is a world-renowned accordionist and composer, multi-instrumentalist, band-leader, and
highly acclaimed vocalist, as well as a master instructor of classical Arabic music. He teaches and
performs regularly throughout the United States. He has taught Arabic music and theory at U.C.
Berkeley as well as at many other elite higher learning institutions throughout the world. Additionally,
Elias teaches private lessons and weekly group classes in classical and contemporary Arabic music,
theory, and performance. Elias has toured throughout the Arab world and Europe. Born in Lebanon, he
currently performs and teaches in San Francisco.
Naser Musa (oud)
A Jordanian of Palestinian decent, Naser Musa is recognized by critics of middle eastern music as a
talented singer, a gifted songwriter, an oud virtuoso, a valued composer, and a versatile studio musician.
Naser Musa has composed, arranged, and recorded numerous projects in the Middle East and in the
United States. His recording, among others, include “Khaliji” (RT Productions): a collection of folk
songs from the Arabian Gulf region, and “Christmas and Beyond “(SahaRaneen Productions): a
collection of Western Christmas carols and Arabic church hymns. Naser Musa’s name appears on
dozens of albums, including contributions on projects for Hollywood with John Debney and John
Cameron among others. He has recorded with pop stars Shakira, Beyonce and Michael Sembello. Naser
Musa has shared the stage with Lebanese vocalists, Sabah and Ragheb Alame, and Egyptian vocalists,
Hani Shaker and Hakim. Mr. Musa was featured as a soloist with the Cairo Orchestra during its 2005
U.S. tour. The Washington Post described his compositions as “stirring”; the Beirut Times described
him as one of the most versatile vocalists and oud masters of the Middle East; and the Al Qabas
newspaper of Kuwait described him as a talented songwriter with a soothing voice that touches the
heart.
Tim O’Keefe (percussion)
Tim O’Keefe is widely renowned as one of the top percussionists in the Twin Cities. He has performed
in venues as far away as Jerash, Bethlehem, and Bir Zeit music festivals in the Middle East. He has
appeared with some of the top artists in Arabic, Persian, and Kurdish music including Simon Shaheen
and Al-Qantra, Settar, Morteza, Sussan, and Sivan Perwar. In 2005, Tim was on the percussion staff of
the Arabic Music Retreat. Locally he performs with Tuareg, Saharan Nights, and Amwaaj Brasamba,
and co-directs Batucada do Norte drum ensemble. Recently he recorded “The Passionate Voice of the
Oud” with Sakher Hattar, Jordanian oud master.
Susu Pampinen (tabla)
Susu Pampanin has explored and studied all types of percussion instruments and styles of music, and her
incredible talent is especially evident in her work in Middle Eastern drumming. Susu is well known for
her virtuosity in Arabic drumming and is one of the few female Middle Eastern drummers highly
respected by the Arabic professional music community. She has worked and recorded with fusion
ensembles including Wild Mango, Keith Terry and Crosspulse, Stellamara, Jazayer, Blue Nile, and
Vince Delgado Quintet. Her first CD, Susu and the Cairo Cats, is known and loved by belly dancers
throughout the world. Hands of Time is her most recent solo CD.
Nikolai Ruskin (nay, mizmar)
Nikolai Ruskin is a multi-instrumentalist known for his skill on a variety of instruments from around the
Middle East. His influences range from Egyptian folk music to sweeping cinematic scores to Japanese
Taiko drums, Gypsy violins, and grinding heavy metal riffs. Outside of the studio he has performed
traditional Middle Eastern music, world fusion, punk rock, metal, Indian and Celtic music. On the stage
Nikolai specializes in Middle Eastern percussion instruments as well as the oud, nay, zurna, and rababa.
In the studio he can be heard playing kanun (a Turkish zither), violin, guitar, bass, drum kit and cello.
Nikolai composes in a variety of styles including Middle Eastern, world fusion, orchestral, funk, rock,
electronic and heavy metal.
Nikolai grew up as an artist in San Francisco and Sonoma County, California, but shifted his focus to an
intensive study of traditional instruments from Arab, Turkish, and Persian music. He formed the gypsy
music inspired band “Gadje” with guitarist Art Bakert in 1998, and in 2002 he co-founded the Cornell
Middle Eastern Music Ensemble in Ithaca, NY, of which he was the Musical Director until 2006.
His past performances include appearances with musicians from a variety of traditions, including Naser
Musa, Amir El Saffar, Yair Dalal, Latif Bolat, the Sharq Ensemble, Turbo Tabla, and Zikrayat. Nikolai’s
recording credits include a recent collaboration with one of the top video game composers Jesper Kyd,
“Zikrayat: Live at Lotus” by Zikrayat, “The Belly and the Beat” by Turbo Tabla, “the River is High” by
Gadje, and “The Songs of Sayyed Darweesh: Soul of a People” by the Chicago Classical Oriental
Ensemble.