The intro with oud taksim had a cello playing an A pedal note chosen by Elie. The taksim is open in length and Elie gave a cue towards the end, moving into the piano and vocal part in the key of C. When the verse repeats the string orchestra is introduced, followed by the rest of the instruments in the refrain. Elie is an excellent master of both bud and buzuq, and when he asked me how long the taksim should be I said it was his decision, and not mine, as it was his moment. For the record we had to cut down on the intro, although this raises an ethical issue of editing an artistic performance. The edits were done with a focus on musicality, and fitted to his style of playing so that it still had the natural feel. This meant letting the phrases or musical lines play out and cutting parts out, rather than certain notes. In a live concert setting, the mood often allows for longer solos, hence taking the audience on a journey. In the process of mixing, I did consider publishing the full intro as a separate track and then the song, since they belong together and online streaming platforms like Spotify do not necessarily put the tracks after each other like on a CD. It makes these decisions difficult, and in the end I had to consider the entire composition.

Choosing the key and structure was in collaboration with Abeer, communicating through WhatsApp, where you can send voice messages. In one month, we had several hundred messages back and forth. The shortage of time and distance prohibited meetings in person, which is always an advantage when working together for the first time. I admire Abeer’s focus and determination musically, and very much appreciated the effort she dedicated to this project. Still, there were a lot of misunderstandings along the way on both ends since we had a different approach on how to do things, along with cultural differences as well. Because combining complex harmonies with instrumental elements is unusual in The Middle East it was not easy to illustrate this with audio sketches from Logic without vocals. Advocating for the importance of complex harmonies was challenging since I could not provide a sufficient soundscape inside Logic with incomplete sketches. I could only show this at the rehearsal with the orchestra.

Arriving at the rehearsal two days before the concert was the first time Abeer heard the full arrangement and orchestration, and we only had 20 minutes for rehearsal the first night and 10 minutes the following day. In Norway, classical orchestras have a very good labour union and many administrative routines. In Lebanon the orchestra will stay as long as the vocalists want, but in Norway they have a strict time schedule that if extended by one minute triggers an overtime payment for all the musicians in the orchestra. The lyrics were written by Lucas Sakr and needed some small adjustments to fit the melody, so Abeer and I rehearsed with piano and vocal alone for one hour in the evening. Abeer had some breathtakingly beautiful ornamentations that I wanted to lock into certain places in the melody, but she argued that her ornamentations were emotionally connected and changed or varied for each performance, and it was of course her privilege to do so.

It took some time to get the recorded tracks from the KSO, since their committee had to approve the artistic quality of the string orchestra. After mixing the album, I sent it to the committee again for their approval for publication.

Because both Abeer and I had been so involved in all the different stages of the tune from improvisation to the finished song, the copyrights were unclear. We were entangled in this, and trying to find out how to solve it. We agreed that I would keep the rights for the specific recorded version, and that she would get all the rights for the tune in the future.

We kept in contact and found time to meet again at J.P. Studios in Jounieh for three days in May 2017 for three days of improvising and writing new tunes. Our musical project is ongoing, but the challenge of working in different parts of the world is to dedicate enough time to follow up with all of the different projects. Abeer is one of my favourite Arabic vocalists, and has a strong sound signature with a wide range of styles and music traditions.