Track Listing

1. Stiga
2. Zamak
3. Hadra
4. Garden
5. Uchera Minah
6. Meta
7. Iz Pod Duba
8. New Moon Hilal
9. Stojnele' Stokole

Product Details

• Released on: 2002-04-01
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: Import
• Original language: English
• Dimensions: .20 pounds

From Amazon.com
The San Francisco Bay Area is a magnet for world music players, and Lumin is another bubble floating up from that global stew. The group is born from another band, called Stellamara, with Jeffrey Stott and Michael Emenau. In Lumin, they are joined by singer Irina Mikhailova. Born in Kazakhstan, Mikhailova is an enchantress who wails in a voice that fuses her Kazakh and Russian roots, with eastern European vocal styles and Middle Eastern effects. Sometimes singing in Bulgarian, her native Kazakh, or her own hybrid dialect, she creates the sound of ecstasy and lament, often simultaneously. Mikhailova is surrounded by a kinetic mix of grooves from Emenau, free-wheeling through a rhythmic landscape of electronic sounds and acoustic percussion samples. Stott weaves it all together, playing Middle Eastern oud, hammered dulcimer, and a bowed string & drone instrument called the yali-tambur. While rooted in folk music, it's a hallucinatory blend, laced to trance grooves and melodies that reach across the heavens and into the soul. --John Diliberto

CD Description
Lumin formed in 1998 by Stellamara co-founder and producer Jeffery Stott, and composer Michael Emenau, expands and defines the elements of world electronic music. Featuring the gorgeous vocals of Irina Mikhailova, Lumin brilliantly fuses the ancient and the modern. A stunning live combination of Sufi Trance, drum and bass, Balkan Choir, and down tempo grooves that will satisfy the urban club set as well as the world music aficionado.

About the Artist
Jeffery Stott has been deftly merging the worlds of modern ambient music production and middle eastern traditional musics for over a decade. He has studied rural and classical forms with a vast array of master musicians from Morocco, Algeria, Egypt, Iran and Turkey who reside in the vibrant Bay Area world music community. His insatiable curiosity has led him to become accomplished on several traditional middle eastern instruments including oud, baglama, yali tambur, and santoor, as well as the full range of percussion instruments of the middle east. In the digital realm, he has composed for several films, large scale dance and theatrical productions. As a founder of the successful group Stellamara, he sought to create a new form of ambient devotional music employing the sacred and sublime aspects of ancient forms from the middle east and medieval Europe and state of the art technology. His latest effort with Lumin seeks to continue in this rich vein of beauty and depth.

Michael Emenau has worked professionally as a classical and jazz musician throughout the last decade in Canada, Asia, and the US. He spent five years living in Japan where he honed his skills as a studio musician, playing and recording extensively in the acid-jazz field, as well as other "dance" and electronic oriented music. His time in Asia (including extended time in India, Thailand, Malaysia, Vietnam, and Korea) has greatly influenced his conceptualization of what music is; its colors and use of time and space. Upon arriving in the Bay Area, he became emersed in what he feels are the two strongest characters the area has to offer; a diverse multi-ethnic population, and a vibrant high-tech industry. These diverging factors has led to a unique way of producing music, heavily reliant on technology, but subtle, colorful, and above all else, beautiful.

Irina Mikhailova, born in Kazakhstan, a Central Asian republic in the former Soviet Union. was trained at the St. Petersburg Academy of Music. While growing up and studying in Central Asia she absorbed many musical traditions including Balkan, Middle Eastern, Russian and Asian. She has brought her beautiful vocal presence to an eclectic range of music including classical and traditional songs as well as electronica and crossover genres. She brought her talents to the San Francisco bay area, where she joined the renound Balkan womens choir Kitka. She has gone on to perform with Linda Tillery, members of Oregon, George Brooks and Sovoso. She has toured internationally and been featured at several prestigious festivals and international events around the world. Her latest solo release Russian Twilight is available on Well Tempered World records.