Our first single is released on Friday 17th June! A momentous occasion!
A result of a four day session with the aim to involve as many 'jungle' musicians and residents as possible. By this stage in the project (Jan '16) we had regular musicians and collaborators. Many feature on this track.
It's an upbeat, Middle Eastern (not surprisingly!) influenced, catchy track. Feaures two fantastic Kurdish drummers (brothers) and is a showcase for our young lyricists (sisters, aged 9 and 12) from Afghanistan. Their original poem was in English but we asked them to translate it into Farsi and to make it fit with the music of the talented Andy Kyte (UK). This wasn't easy, but a few hours later, they emerged from their caravan triumphant. They recruited their friend from a neigbouring caravan to sing the lead, we gathered the chorus together from the regulars, a few string players popped over on the ferry, the remarkable Burgess family picked up their instruments and the studio was set up. Notes were learnt, pronunciations attempted (from the UK side!), on went the red light (if we had one) and four days later we were done. Filmmakers and journalists Emiland Guillerme and Stefania Rousselle even shot and cut a music video!
We hope you like it!
The track Khandahar features on The Calais Sessions album. We hope you will consider buying the album. Proceeds from the sales go to the lead refugee musicians and to Citizens UK - fighting for the legal rights of unaccompanied refugee children to be reunited with their relatives in the UK.
You can buy it on bandcamp, itunes, amazon and directly from this website ('buy music').
https://thecalaissessions.bandcamp.com/releases
Thank you!
Lyrics:
I am happy, like a myna (type of bird) x3
Life in a caravan, thinking about my friends,
Let's go to the garden.
We have too many problems,
Wishing to pray five times a day,
We smile in our faces, all the time and every day,
But I am acting, acting of happiness,
And I am free
As a bird
Two young sisters (9, 12) from Afghanistan