Daniel and Patrick Lazour Release FLAP MY WINGS: SONGS FROM WE LIVE IN CAIRO
Flap My Wings: Songs from We Live in Cairo, featuring songs from their musical, the Richard Rodgers Award-winning We Live in Cairo, seen in the Spring of 2019.
By: Chloe Rabinowitz Jan. 25, 2021
Brothers, songwriters, and collaborators, Daniel and Patrick Lazour today released their independently-produced album Flap My Wings: Songs from We Live in Cairo, on the tenth anniversary of the Tahrir Square protests that began the Egyptian Revolution in 2011.
Flap My Wings: Songs from We Live in Cairo, featuring songs from their musical, the Richard Rodgers Award-winning We Live in Cairo, seen in the Spring of 2019 at the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is now available via iTunes or Spotify (click to download).
"Ahead of future iterations of this musical, the confluence of the pandemic and national reckoning with state violence and abuses of power challenged us to engage with We Live in Cairo differently," said Daniel and Patrick. "When we are unable come together as normal, how else might we connect to imagine a world different from our own? It is our hope that this album helps to create community through music in an increasingly fractured society."
Virtually gathering an extraordinary group of artists from across the globe during the current coronavirus pandemic, the remotely recorded album features artists from the cast of the musical as well as major Arab activist-songwriters, including Ramy Essam, Emel Mathlouthi, Rotana, Hadi Eldebek, Hamed Sinno, Naseem Alatrash, and the brothers themselves.
In addition to the artists heard on the album, acclaimed Egyptian artist Ganzeer has created the album artwork and a special animation of the title track, Flap My Wings. Animation & Art Direction is by Paul MacLachlan.
Flap My Wings: Songs from We Live in Cairo is executive produced by Madeleine Foster Bersin; music supervision and selected arrangements by Madeline Smith; album art by Ganzeer; conceived with Taibi Magar; music production, sound engineering, and mixing by Robin Buyer; mastering by Ryan Schwabe; with additional orchestrations by Michael Starobin and percussion direction by Jeremy Smith. Flap My Wings: Songs from We Live in Cairo, written by the Lazours, was recorded remotely and at Pulse Music (NYC).
Flap My Wings: Songs from We Live in Cairo was supported by The American Repertory Theater at Harvard University (Diane Paulus, Artistic Director; Diane Borger, Executive Producer) where the stage production of We Live in Cairo had its world premiere on May 22, 2019.
TRACK LIST
1. Genealogy of Revolution
VOCALS and VOCAL ARRANGEMENT: Hamed Sinno
PERCUSSION: Jeremy Smith
RECORDING LOCATION: Philadelphia, NYC
2. Wall Song
VOCALS: the Lazours
OUD FEATURE: Hadi Eldebek
PERCUSSION: Jeremy Smith
BASS: John Murchison
ORGAN: Madeline Smith
GUITAR: Daniel Lazour
RECORDING LOCATION: NYC
3. Cairo Street Scenes
VOCALS: Rotana
PERCUSSION: Jeremy Smith
BASS: John Murchison
OUD: Ghassan Sawalhi
PIANO: Madeline Smith
BACKGROUND VOCALS: the Lazours and Madeline Smith
VIOLIN: Bengisu Gokce
CELLO: Naseem Alatrash
VOCAL PRODUCTION: Satta
RECORDING LOCATIONS: NYC, Los Angeles
4. Movement
VOCALS: Jakeim Hart, Parisa Shahmir
PERCUSSION: Jeremy Smith
BASS: John Murchison
GUITAR, STRING ARRANGEMENT: Daniel Lazour
VIOLIN: Bengisu Gokce
CELLO: Naseem Alatrash
RECORDING LOCATIONS: NYC, Mexico City, Boston
5. Loud Voice
VOCALS: Haboya
ARRANGEMENT, PRODUCER, KEYBOARDS: Mohamed Araki
BASS, DRUMS: Mohammed Hassan
PERCUSSION: Jeremy Smith
RECORDING LOCATIONS: Cairo, Boston, Washington D.C., NYC
6. Flap My Wings
VOCALS: the Lazours
PERCUSSION: Jeremy Smith
BASS & QANUN: John Murchison
GUITAR: Daniel Lazour
OUD: Ghassan Sawalhi
VIOLIN: Bengisu Gokce
CELLO: Naseem Alatrash
ARRANGEMENT, PIANO: Madeline Smith
SELECTED ORCHESTRATIONS: Michael Starobin
RECORDING LOCATIONS: NYC, Boston
7. Living Here
VOCALS and VOCAL ARRANGEMENT: Emel Mathlouthi
PERCUSSION: Jeremy Smith
BASS: John Murchison
PIANO: Madeline Smith
GUITAR: Daniel Lazour
OUD: Ghassan Sawalhi
VIOLIN: Bengisu Gokce
CELLO: Naseem Alatrash
RECORDING LOCATIONS: Paris, NYC, Boston
8. Each & Every Name (Instrumental)
FEATURED CELLIST: Naseem Alatrash
ARRANGEMENT: Naseem Alatrash
RECORDING LOCATION: Washington D.C
9. The 18 Days: In The Morning
10. The 18 Days: A Million People
11. The 18 Days: Our Square
VOCALISTS: Cast of the American Repertory Theater's 2019 Production
SOLOIST: Parisa Shahmir
ADDITIONAL VOCALS: Jakeim Hart, Sharif Afifi, Layan Elwazani, Gil Perez-
Abraham, Abubakr Ali, Dana Saleh Omar, Madeline Smith, the Lazours
PERCUSSION: Jeremy Smith
BASS: John Murchison
ELECTRIC GUITAR: Nacho Gonzalez
ACOUSTIC GUITAR: Daniel Lazour
OUD: Ghassan Sawalhi
VIOLIN: Bengisu Gokce
CELLO: Naseem Alatrash
SELECTED ORCHESTRATIONS: Michael Starobin
PIANO, ARRANGEMENTS: Madeline Smith
RECORDING LOCATIONS: NYC, Mexico City, Boston, Washington D.C., Various
12. Tahrir is Now
VOCALISTS: Ramy Essam, the Lazours
PERCUSSION: Jeremy Smith
BASS: John Murchison
ACOUSTIC GUITAR: Daniel Lazour
ELECTRIC GUITAR: Nacho Gonzalez
OUD: Ghassan Sawalhi
ACCORDION: Madeline Smith
VIOLIN: Bengisu Gokce
CELLO: Naseem Alatrash
VOCAL ARRANGEMENTS: RAMY ESSAM, Madeline Smith
ADDITIONAL ORCHESTRATIONS: Michael Starobin
RECORDING LOCATIONS: Stockholm, NYC, Various
13. Dreaming Words (Demo)
VOCALS: the Lazours
GUITAR: Daniel Lazour
RECORDING LOCATION: Seabright Beach, Santa Cruz, California
ABOUT THE ALBUM
Flap My Wings: Songs from We Live in Cairo features reconceptualized songs from the score of Daniel Lazour and Patrick Lazour's Richard Rodgers Award-winning musical We Live in Cairo as interpreted by some of the world's foremost Arab and Arab-American singers, musicians, and revolutionaries alongside the Lazours themselves. Returning to the score's roots as a series of protest songs and using remote recording technology to engage collaborators around the world, Flap My Wings, which was conceived and recorded entirely during 2020's global quarantines and lockdowns, explores the politics and aesthetics of protest and self-expression under extraordinary circumstances.
ABOUT "WE LIVE IN CAIRO"
Inspired by the young Egyptians who took to the streets in 2011 to overthrow President Hosni Mubarak, We Live in Cairo follows six revolutionary students armed with laptops and cameras, guitars and spray cans as they come of age in contemporary Cairo. We Live in Cairo moves from the jubilation of Tahrir Square through the tumultuous years that followed. As escalating division and violence lead to a military crackdown, the revolutionaries of Tahrir must confront the question of how-or even whether-to keep their dreams of change alive.
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