British-Bahrainian trumpeter and composer Yazz Ahmed has been called “The High Priestess of Psychedelic Arabic Jazz”. An artist who blends electronic sound design, jazz improvisation and her Bahraini heritage into a hypnotic and richly layered musical world. On her fourth album, A Paradise in the Hold, she writes for the voice for the first time, with lyrics inspired by the sorrow songs of pearl divers and the celebratory chants of Bahraini women’s drumming circles.
The music shifts between immersive soundscapes and rhythmically euphoric passages, with handclaps, field recordings, and soaring trumpet arrangements placing the listener at the centre of the sound. The Guardian called it “infectiously jubilant,” while Loud & Quiet described it as “a gloriously out-there fusion epic.”
Together with her genre-fluid Hafla ensemble and guest vocalists including Natacha Atlas and Randolph Matthews, Ahmed leads us on a poetic, ritualistic, and emotionally expansive journey where female voices, rhythm and myth converge into a universe all its own.
