Lamia Yared & Efren Lopez

From Minho to Euphrates

Lebanese-born singer Lamia Yared & Spanish multi-instrumentalist Efrén López perform music from the Arab world and medieval Iberia.

Drawing on Yared’s Syriac-Maronite heritage and her deep immersion in Arabic, Ottoman, Persian, and medieval repertoires, the program weaves together 4th-century Syriac hymns, Aleppine Muwashahāt, medieval Iberian song, Sufi poetry, and a rare 13th-century composition by Safi al-Din al-Urmawi, one of the great theorists of Middle Eastern music.

Through López’s inventive modal arrangements, music from medieval Iberia is reimagined through the maqam system, revealing unexpected affinities between Galician-Portuguese devotion, Eastern Mediterranean ornamentation, and the living traditions of Arabic and Ottoman music. What emerges is not simply a historical reconstruction, but a contemporary dialogue across languages, faiths, and civilisations.

Nawres Alfreh is an Iraqi-born musician and accomplished performer specialising in the Iraqi maqam tradition. A graduate of the Baghdad Conservatory of Music, he has performed alongside renowned artists including Naseer Shamma and Farida Mohammad Ali.

Based in Brisbane, Nawres performs on violin, Joza and kamanche and is the founder of Shanasheel Arabic Music Ensemble, which regularly performs at concerts, festivals and cultural events. He has also performed with Camerata of St John’s, the Brisbane Philharmonic Orchestra, and various Arabic and Middle Eastern music projects across Australia.

At once intimate, scholarly, and deeply expressive, From Minho to Euphrates invites listeners into a shared human story: one in which Christian hymns, Sufi poetry, courtly song, and ancient modal traditions continue to speak to one another across time.

★★★★ To say that this album explores medieval religious music from around the Mediterranean undersells it. – Songlines UK

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Street Two | Unreserved | Duration 75 Minutes
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