Eamonn Sheehy's Blog
April 23, 2016
Music from the Square Of The Dead - Jemaa El Fna after Sundown, Marrakech, Morocco
Here is a new recording from my last trip to Morocco - this time Marrakech's Square Of The Dead (Jemaa El Fna). A live music jam from one of the many music circles that take over the square after sundown.
Jemaa El Fna, Marrakech's main square is a lively place at the best of times, but it really comes into its own at night. A wander across this centuries old theatre of human spectacle in the twilight hours can be chaotic and exhilarating. Hot food stalls, Snake Charmers, Street boxing, Scammers, Traders and (for me the best of all) ecstatic live music.
On any given night you can pick from a variety of styles, all Moroccan - and drift in and out between dizzying guitar jams and whirling call and response chorus's. This 5 minute recording is from one of my favourite musical circles who played the square over the few nights I was in Marrakech.
They remind me of Nass Marrakech - but I am not aware of this groups name.
If you have been to Jemaa El Fna, please comment below to tell us what you experienced!
Video and photography at:
http://www.migratetothefringe.com/blo...
Summer In The City State
Jemaa El Fna, Marrakech's main square is a lively place at the best of times, but it really comes into its own at night. A wander across this centuries old theatre of human spectacle in the twilight hours can be chaotic and exhilarating. Hot food stalls, Snake Charmers, Street boxing, Scammers, Traders and (for me the best of all) ecstatic live music.
On any given night you can pick from a variety of styles, all Moroccan - and drift in and out between dizzying guitar jams and whirling call and response chorus's. This 5 minute recording is from one of my favourite musical circles who played the square over the few nights I was in Marrakech.
They remind me of Nass Marrakech - but I am not aware of this groups name.
If you have been to Jemaa El Fna, please comment below to tell us what you experienced!
Video and photography at:
http://www.migratetothefringe.com/blo...
Summer In The City State
February 11, 2016
Morocco - Nass El Ghiwane in Jamaa El Fnaa (Square Of The Dead), Marrakech 2015
Those of you who have been to Marrakech will no doubt have revelled in the dark excitements of Jemaa El Fnaa - the Square Of The Dead. My recent trip to Morocco, where I took a long haul trip across the Southern flank of this jaw- droppingly large country, meant a first for me in Marrakech. And in Jemaa, I managed to come across some excellent traditional music. I got some of the live sets on camera, initially for the sound (I love listening back to soundscapes of different cities I have visited), but the video is interested, albeit shaky.
Now, I absolutely hate sideways videos - but I got a bit confused in the dark and chaos of a late night Jemaa El Fnaa. I had just been rumbled by the snake charmers of the Square, who fleeced me and a travel friend of ten euro, so I was still a bit unnerved and disorientated. Nevertheless, what we ended up witnessing (I have been informed) were the remaining members of a classic Moroccan band called Nass El Ghiwane.
The music is utterly fantastic. Nass El Ghiwane are the same band from the Ahmed El Maanouni 1981 film 'Transes', which was restored and released on the Criterion Collection by Martin Scorsese a few years back. As you can see from the start of the 'Transes' video, the mania surrounding this band in their heyday reached something of a frenzy, and quiet unseen in modern day terms.
I have another sample of an equally fantastic band of musicians I recorded in Jemaa El Fnaa on this recent November trip which I will post in the next blog update. Meanwhile enjoy, and please comment with any recommended places to visit for my next trip to Marrakech!
http://youtu.be/NsE3xCpFUXk
Now, I absolutely hate sideways videos - but I got a bit confused in the dark and chaos of a late night Jemaa El Fnaa. I had just been rumbled by the snake charmers of the Square, who fleeced me and a travel friend of ten euro, so I was still a bit unnerved and disorientated. Nevertheless, what we ended up witnessing (I have been informed) were the remaining members of a classic Moroccan band called Nass El Ghiwane.
The music is utterly fantastic. Nass El Ghiwane are the same band from the Ahmed El Maanouni 1981 film 'Transes', which was restored and released on the Criterion Collection by Martin Scorsese a few years back. As you can see from the start of the 'Transes' video, the mania surrounding this band in their heyday reached something of a frenzy, and quiet unseen in modern day terms.
I have another sample of an equally fantastic band of musicians I recorded in Jemaa El Fnaa on this recent November trip which I will post in the next blog update. Meanwhile enjoy, and please comment with any recommended places to visit for my next trip to Marrakech!
http://youtu.be/NsE3xCpFUXk
January 23, 2016
Writing 'Summer In The City State': North Africa captured in image from Ceuta to Tangier
While my forthcoming book Summer In The City State has been a labour of text - writing and rewriting, correcting and revising - the images I framed on the trip itself are frozen, suspended and clear.
Anyone who writes can attest to the struggles of conveyance. It comes in stages. First you are happy to get words down, and mould them into some sort of clear, engaging
form. You work on different scenes and try to transpose the excitement living in your imagination onto the white space before you. The seasons change, summer into winter, but you keep pushing on with the process. Then comes the feeling of eureka - towards an ending. And with it, the warm self-affirming feeling of achievement. It's cosy for a while.
The second stage eventually turns up on the scene. The clouds move in, the sky darkens and you are entrenched in some weeks and months of word-thrashing, cliché culling and sentence decapitation. It is violent and disorientating. You start to tire, the focus becomes poorly. SELF DOUBT. Coffee binges. Concern.
One way out was to stand back and look. Assessing my own principles of writing and more importantly my ethics of nonfiction. When it comes to writing, for me its the gloss - stripe that shit down. And for the area I am writing in - this is nonfiction, memoir, culture, immersive journalism - call it what you want. So I had to get some things straight in my head and stop stalling the ball. Nonfiction is reality, and reality cannot be reformulated. The story happens and you tell it. This is where the culling and thrashing comes in. I cut out the fluff. 'No filler all killer' as the punks used to say. Eventually the calm returned and some sense of, albeit shorter, form was achieved.
The images - a series of photography captured from the initial stages of the journey, aboard a ferry across the Mediterranean to Ceuta, through the cities of the Rif Mountains and on the streets of Tangier - had solidified into their own micro-story. I sifted through some three hundred plus pictures. The people and places photographed did the work for me. The location of Ceuta and Tangier. The natural environment. Bingo.
And once I discarded 'the fear', the hesitation of combining a written narrative with a photographic form - I began to see that it all 'works'. The book now in its complete form, is not a 'travel' book in the traditional sense (despite possibly falling into this category in your online bookstore). It is a capture of my perspective against a backdrop of tumultuous times for many living on the border regions of North Africa and Southern Europe. It is a test of my own perceptions and levels of acceptance. It is a study of social tension and escape.
Here are some of the images from 'Summer In The City State'.
Paperback and digital formats will see the light of day on 8th April 2016. But you are free to contact me about getting an advance paperback edition, or just click and pre-order digital formats now:
http://www.migratetothefringe.com/blo...
Anyone who writes can attest to the struggles of conveyance. It comes in stages. First you are happy to get words down, and mould them into some sort of clear, engaging
form. You work on different scenes and try to transpose the excitement living in your imagination onto the white space before you. The seasons change, summer into winter, but you keep pushing on with the process. Then comes the feeling of eureka - towards an ending. And with it, the warm self-affirming feeling of achievement. It's cosy for a while.
The second stage eventually turns up on the scene. The clouds move in, the sky darkens and you are entrenched in some weeks and months of word-thrashing, cliché culling and sentence decapitation. It is violent and disorientating. You start to tire, the focus becomes poorly. SELF DOUBT. Coffee binges. Concern.
One way out was to stand back and look. Assessing my own principles of writing and more importantly my ethics of nonfiction. When it comes to writing, for me its the gloss - stripe that shit down. And for the area I am writing in - this is nonfiction, memoir, culture, immersive journalism - call it what you want. So I had to get some things straight in my head and stop stalling the ball. Nonfiction is reality, and reality cannot be reformulated. The story happens and you tell it. This is where the culling and thrashing comes in. I cut out the fluff. 'No filler all killer' as the punks used to say. Eventually the calm returned and some sense of, albeit shorter, form was achieved.
The images - a series of photography captured from the initial stages of the journey, aboard a ferry across the Mediterranean to Ceuta, through the cities of the Rif Mountains and on the streets of Tangier - had solidified into their own micro-story. I sifted through some three hundred plus pictures. The people and places photographed did the work for me. The location of Ceuta and Tangier. The natural environment. Bingo.
And once I discarded 'the fear', the hesitation of combining a written narrative with a photographic form - I began to see that it all 'works'. The book now in its complete form, is not a 'travel' book in the traditional sense (despite possibly falling into this category in your online bookstore). It is a capture of my perspective against a backdrop of tumultuous times for many living on the border regions of North Africa and Southern Europe. It is a test of my own perceptions and levels of acceptance. It is a study of social tension and escape.
Here are some of the images from 'Summer In The City State'.
Paperback and digital formats will see the light of day on 8th April 2016. But you are free to contact me about getting an advance paperback edition, or just click and pre-order digital formats now:
http://www.migratetothefringe.com/blo...
January 17, 2016
Tartu and Kallaste - An Estonian Winter
I just posted a photo essay on my website about Tartu and Kallaste in winter, on the shores of Lake Peipsi, Estonia.
A vignette on this little travelled to region of Europe.
http://www.migratetothefringe.com/blo...
A vignette on this little travelled to region of Europe.
http://www.migratetothefringe.com/blo...
December 30, 2015
Summer In The City State
Eamonn SheehyI am in the process of getting the book ready for a paperback format and it is looking great. Pre-orders will be available shortly via digital formats and the cool paperback format.
Add the book to your shelfs and follow me to keep up to date for special giveaways of this nonfiction travel book soon!
Add the book to your shelfs and follow me to keep up to date for special giveaways of this nonfiction travel book soon!
