In 1989, cultural theorist Stuart Hall wrote that one’s identity was „an endless, ever unfinished conversation“. A conversation that does not follow straight lines, but is more often than not messy, painful, take its time, yet also full of beauty and a renewed sense of strength and empowerment.

On FEAST, Donya Solaimani’s debut EP, the Berlin-born, Cologne-based singer and composer invites her audience to take part in this conversation, a conversation about musical direction and genre, about origins, roots, and futures, about dreams, doubts and determination. Having come of age in and around music, the artist started her musical education at age seven, and has written songs all her life, before embarking on a musical journey that would take her to Copenhagen, where she was immersed in both the city’s classical music world, as well as its indie scene, and Cologne, where she is currently undergoing a postgraduate degree Jazz performance at the city’s highly regarded conservatory. In Berlin, she was involved in minimal music projects such as Maya Shenfeld’s Julius Eastman Projekt, or experimental programs such as artist Zorka Wollny’s commissioned work „Dissent“ during CTM festival. „Between all these different influences“, she says, „the love for pop music was always a constant presence in my life!“

With FEAST, she showcases how her diverse musical influences of her life and education mesh together to create a sound that’s fully her own. Opening with „Chahar Pareh“, Solaimani puts this musical mix together with her personal history center stage in this remarkable debut. She performs a poem by the Iranian 18th-century poet Hatef Esfahani in a unique singing style that is both inspired by Solaimani’s practice as a classical and jazz vocalist and her interest in pop music, as well as by Persian classical music traditions she has come to know in the past few years. Solaimani’s wistful vocals are stunningly complemented by a sonical landscape similarly rooted in Persian music, but given an indie music treatment with synths, electric guitars, percussion – and a melancholic trumpet floating above it all. Starting out with minimal instrumentation, it grows into a composition of epic character while Solaimani makes the original poem fully her own.

„Sorry“ seems like the opener’s natural opposite: with a running time of just under three minutes, it’s the shortest song of FEAST. A collaboration with the trumpet player Ferdinand Schwarz, recorded in Copenhagen, Solaimani writes and sings about the feeling unable reciprocate romantic feelings by evoking precise and heartbreaking mental images, from the „dishes that pile up high in the sink“ to begging her counterpart not to bring flowers „next time you come to town.“

Inspired by legendary Canadian trumpet player Kenny Wheeler’s “Opening”, Solaimani releases her audience into the world with her very own take on the Ambient Jazz genre that has undergone renewed popularity since the Pharoah Sanders/Floating Points collaboration „Promises“. „My Brain Is Slow (But My Bike Is Fast)“, does away lyrics and celebrates the jazz tradition of instrumental singing. A dreamy composition full of lightness, it is also a clever musical riddle for those who dare to listen closely, and recognize how the melody slowly takes shape and grows in length and boldness.

On „Another Spring“, recorded and produced by Pascal Klewer, Solaimani delivers her own take on Iranian culture with a very personal, intimate song about memories of childhood visits to the country of one of her parent’s origins, the food, the places, and the warmth of familial connections, but also about the grief of missing holidays, and the pressures that come with being a child of two worlds – but still forging one’s own path.

Simultaneously to releasing FEAST, Donya Solaimani also publishes an insightful essay on how this debut EP came to be, touching upon topics such as personal and musical identity, but also racism in the music world. Eloquently, she shares how ill-fitting stereotypes and clichés are projected upon musicians and composers of colour, and analyses the stifling tightness of genres and their margins, illustrating the great care and deep thinking that has accompanied the creation of FEAST.

Working together with a number of fellow artists such as Schwarz, Klewer, Annie Bloch on synths and most importantly Jan Philipp who produced all songs except “Another Spring” and provided drums for “Chahar Pareh” and “My Brain Is Slow But My Bike Is Fast”, Donya Solaimani created a confident musical statement with FEAST. It is a statement about who she is and the world she aims to create: a musical world that is deeply personal, yet highly relatable at the same time. That is firmly grounded in the jazz- and experimental world, but is open to inspiration and growth from wherever it may come from. And judging from this first taste of her mastery, she is a voice that will be heard from again, and again, and again.

Press release by Aida Baghernejad