Simon Shaheen
Simon Shaheen ( born 1955 in Tarshiha, Israel) is a native of Israel American world music artists and jazz musician and composer. His main instruments are the oud and the violin.
Life and work
At the age of two years, Shaheen moved with his family to Haifa. He spent most weekends in Tarshiha, an Israeli Arab city.
He learned the short-necked lute oud five years, the violin a little later. Shaheen graduated from the Tel Aviv University, statements made in Arabic literature and musicology. Later he continued his studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
1980 Shaheen emigrated to the USA to study at the Manhattan School of Music and Columbia University, and to become a U.S. citizen.
Shaheen founded the Near Eastern Music Ensemble, which lists classical Arab music. He organized annually find Arabic concerts and art festivals. Concerts
Shaheen, a Catholic Arab, lives and works in New York City. There he runs an Arabic ensemble called Qantara which he himself founded. Qantara merges elements of jazz, popular music and classical music with Arabic music traditions.
In 1994 he received a National Heritage Fellowship by the Institution National Endowment for the Arts.
In addition to his work in the field of traditional and classical Arabic music has Shaheen part in many cross - cultural music projects. These include concerts with Bill Laswell, Henry Threadgill, Vishwa Mohan Bhatt, Catherine Potter, Frank London and the Klezmatics.