Rahim AlHaj Trio

A 5,000-year-old musical tradition from the heart of Mesopotamia is alive and well in Albuquerque, New Mexico, the adopted home of renowned Iraqi oud virtuoso Rahim AlHaj. AlHaj is a cultural ambassador for the deep musical heritage of his homeland. His music evokes the experience of exile, new beginnings, and “the message of peace and compassion and love” that he shares with audiences to heal a world beset by conflict.

The oud is a fretless, short-necked Arabian lute central to Iraqi music. It is an ancestor of the lute family of instruments that includes the guitar. Traditional Iraqi music is organized into a series of maqamat, or modes. Each maqam has a distinctive scale and specific melodic formulae, and is often associated with a certain mood or season. Unlike Western music, which is based on whole and half tone scales (12 semitones altogether), Iraqi music is based on 24 quarter tones.

AlHaj began learning the oud at the age of nine. Studying under the legendary Munir Bashir and Salim Abdul Kareen at Baghdad’s Conservatory of Fine Arts, Rahim established himself as one of the world’s foremost oudists. But his political activities were anathema to Saddam Hussein’s repressive regime, which twice imprisoned him, subjecting him to torture and beatings. His composition entitled “Why,” based on a poem by a longtime friend who lost his legs in the Iran-Iraq War, became an anthem of the resistance movement. During the Gulf War, his mother sold almost all of her belongings to acquire false documents so Rahim could escape a rumored assassination by security forces.

In 2000, AlHaj was granted political asylum in the United States, landing in Albuquerque, where he got a job as a security guard. Unsatisfied, AlHaj rented a music hall at the University of New Mexico and organized his first U.S. solo concert, relaunching an international music career. He is now a two-time Grammy nominee. Rahim became a U.S. citizen in 2008, and in 2015 he was awarded a National Endowment for the Arts National Heritage Fellowship, our nation’s highest honor in the folk and traditional arts.

The Rahim AlHaj Trio features two other musicians, Ahmed Albandawi and percussionist Nick Baker. Albandawi is a master santour player from Iraq. After earning a music degree from the Music and Ballet School in Baghdad, he traveled throughout the country performing and gaining extensive knowledge in both folk and classical Iraqi music. After migrating to the United States over a decade ago, Albandawi has continued sharing his passion and talent for the music of his homeland, while also exploring new techniques on the santour. Together, this trio is sure to delight Jackson audiences with the captivating melodies of traditional Iraqi music.