MUSIC

Ashtabiez brings together distinctive musical voices through the compositions of Yamen Martini. Inspired by genres such as jazz and oriental music and influenced by encounters traversing the Middle East and Europe, the collective fuses genres with personal testimonies.

Since 2022, its members explored new avenues while building on their classical and jazz backgrounds, shaping Ashtabiez into a borderless endeavour.

With a name based on the transliteration of ﻉ‎, the eighteenth letter of the Arabic alphabet and one of the most difficult vowels to pronounce, 3’Ain brings to the audience contemporary jazz and world music with oriental influences.

Yamen Martini (trumpet) Otto Kint (upright bass) and Piet Maris (accordion) joined forces for this trio that has quickly found its steady fan base, released two EPs, and has been performing across Belgium extensively.

“Almost every note evokes an image in itself. All very stylised like the soundtracks of the Greek Eleni Karaindrou for the films of Theo Angelopoulos. Music without excessive decibels or hip electronic effects – but with a sincere gut feeling.”

– Georges Tonla Briquet, Jazzenzo Jazzmagazine

Comartinuts is a duo of DJ Coconuts (Hans Vandemaele) and Yamen Martini presenting a shared travel experience through music. Born in 2022, the project combines musical influences from east to west, creating an unexpected mix that makes you transgress to an experimental world.

MOVE is the fifth inclusive theatre project of the Cultural Centre of Mortsel. It’s a unique play that wants to contribute to the social participation and integration of people with disabilities for an inclusive society without barriers.

Directed by Caroline Rottier and with music composed by Piet Maris, Martini Rob Kanters and Yamen Martini, MOVE is a poetic story with beautiful images and live music, brought by 28 disabled players and professional artists who have improvised for a year on the theme of ‘movement’. 

Yamen Martini also composed music for Lettres à Nour, an epistolary play by Franco-Moroccan Islamologist and researcher Rachid Benzine, in the repertoire of the Theatre of Liège, Belgium. 

Lettres à Nour tells the story of the exchanges between a father, a practicing Muslim intellectual – living his religion as a message of peace and love -, and his daughter who left for Iraq to join the man she has married in secret and who is a lieutenant of Daesh.