On the doorstep of the Sala Rossa, we learned that the USA had just bombed Iran’s nuclear facilities. What would become of this region? In addition to the Iranian and Israeli populations, could all the countries bordering Iran with Shiite communities, such as Iraq and Lebanon, suffer as a result? Would their inhabitants be the mostly innocent victims, whatever their position on these conflicts and their ability to influence their destiny? This is the profound anxiety in which the artists of the Beirut-based group Sanan live and create on a daily basis.
And it’s just gone up a notch.
On Saturday, however, these artists received a lot of love and passed on just as much, before returning home to face this immense adversity once again.
Sandy Chamoun, the lead singer of Sanam, is an authentic frontwoman, racy, eloquent, theatrical, deeply rooted in rock (post-rock, in fact) and in a resolutely contemporary Arabian style. Incantations, declamations, rock vocals, among other avenues of vocal expression. The singer’s performance oscillates constantly between the dramatic expression of these great melodies, tributary to the sacred and classical Arab chants appropriated by the Arab super divas of previous generations.
Behind Sandy Chamoun, there are rocking, often highly saturated guitars (Anthony Sayoun, Marwan Tohme), acoustic bouzouk (Farah Kaddour) that also keep us glued to Middle Eastern and North African traditions (in addition to the soloist’s voice), there’s solidly executed drumming, drawing on traditional rhythms and Western rock, and there are rich electronic complements, including those of a modular synth contributing the drones needed to express the Levant in an experimental context of rock attitude.
It’s just about impossible not to be captivated by such an atmosphere. It’s also impossible not to applaud this new signing to Montreal’s Constellation label: Sanam’s third album, Sametou Sawtan, will be released in September.
Thanks to our friend Radwan Ghazi Moumneh, co-owner of the Hotel2Tango studio, master of the Jerusalem in my Heart project and instigator of this meeting between Sanam and his Montreal audience in the context of the Suoni. From the outset, he delivered a sermon of drone, chanted and sung words, extreme saturation, tradition and tragic passion.
There we were, in the heart of Arab expression on June 21, 2025, the night things got seriously worse where you know.
