The master of music

A few music notes or the faraway journey

Dad insists on seeing a master of Ouigour music. So the driver drives away from Turpan and brings us to little dirt alleys in a small village. He goes into a small courtyard and there, a medium size man with a moustache invites us into the house. His name is Abdul Rahman Ebrahim. He’s the greatest Ouigour musician in Turpan. We sit cross-legged on the ground, but I have trouble remaining seated like that. He serves us tea and bread hard as wood. After, he gets his instrument and then begins absolute happiness: with his eyes closed he begins to play and sing with a majestic voice. His voice is so beautiful that it brings so many sensations. While filming him, I have trouble not putting down everything to simply listen, but it’s while thinking of my cousin Aydin who plays nearly the same instrument that I keep on filming to be able to show him the footage when I get back to Paris. In the middle of the piece, Harkin plays at max volume the Italian revolutionary song A Belachao but in Russian. Even though dad loves that song, he’s not pleased with this attitude and asks him to turn it off immediately. When he’s finished playing his pieces, he takes us to the other side of his house, on a little shaded patio covered in green Turpanese grape vines that hang above our heads. In the middle of his courtyard is his workshop. On top of being a musician and singer, he makes his own instruments and cribs to make a living. He shows us how, with a machine, he makes the foot of a crib out of carved wood. I find that magnificent and extremely surprising. Dad enquires about the best Ouigour musicians and asks the musician if he has a CD, but he only has VCDs that can’t be read in France. We thank him for everything. When I say goodbye, he takes me in his arms, which I found very touching.