“Songs of a Wandering Soul” tells the story of the modern nomads that leave “Home” in search of meaning, peace, truth and prosperity, and yet they fnd themselves constantly entangled with “Home”: They constantly lose the battle to be fully displaced from their origin and they lose the battle to fully integrate. They remain forever a wanderer.
The music disperses the narrative into three different movements quite arbitrarily, however this piece can be extended in the future to include more movements as the story of the modern nomad has no conclusive end.
Compositionally, the frst and the third movements share many motivic and rhythmic features that ties the whole cycle together as a unifed piece, however the second movement, with its improvisational nature remains as a standalone in the cycle.
I. My accent, my beautiful shackle: When one relocates to a new home, they lose many things: material things, family ties, friendships, jobs and a sense of general familiarity. But the last thing they lose, and most never do, is their accents: The accent incessantly reminds them the origin of their stories. I found this concept to be torterously beautiful, that as though we have moved on from a chapter in life, our past tirelessly calls through every word we utter.
II. Frozen Pictures- For Ardavan: For the modern nomad loss is very complex. I lost one of my best childhood friends to cancer a decade ago, and this movement is an attempt to celebrate his never-fading memory.
III. The mirrors never lie: And every time the nomads look in the mirror, long enough to have a glimpse of self-refection, they see it. They see the everlasting chase of an elusive self-fulfllment: They see the truth, and they bury it.