Broken Branches

Listen on Presto Music. Free thirty day trial. Find out more.

Shibe brings a lively charisma and a vibrant array of musical colour to the album, conjuring everything from 17th-century lute to Arabic oud across this wide-reaching programme. Sulayman’s performance... — BBC Music Magazine, July 2023, 4 out of 5 stars More…

Release Date: 5th May 2023
Catalogue No: PTC5187031
Label: Pentatone
Length: 51 minutes

Presto Recording of the Week

12th May 2023
Grammy Awards

66th Awards (2024)

Nominee - Best Classical Solo Vocal Album

In stock

Usually despatched within 1 working day

Dowland: Time stands still

Work length5:29

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Karim Sulayman (tenor), Sean Shibe (guitar)

Harvey, J: Sufi Dance

Work length2:18

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Sean Shibe (guitar)

Caccini, G: Dalla porta d'oriente

Work length3:23

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Karim Sulayman (tenor), Sean Shibe (guitar)

Monteverdi: Si dolce e'l tormento, SV332

Work length4:27

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Karim Sulayman (tenor), Sean Shibe (guitar)

Monteverdi: La mia turca

Work length2:15

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Karim Sulayman (tenor), Sean Shibe (guitar)

Traditional Sephardic: La prima vez (Arranged Karim Sulayman and Sean Shibe)

Work length3:58

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Karim Sulayman (tenor), Sean Shibe (guitar)

Traditional Arab-Andalusian: Lamma bada yatathanna (Arranged by Sean Shibe)

Work length2:24

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Sean Shibe (guitar)

Darwish: El helwa di (Arranged by Karim Sulayman and Sean Shibe)

Work length3:33

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Karim Sulayman (tenor), Sean Shibe (guitar)

Fairuz: Li Beirut (Arranged by Karim Sulayman and Sean Shibe)

Work length4:07

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Karim Sulayman (tenor), Sean Shibe (guitar)

Chaker: A Butterfly in New York

Work length4:42

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Karim Sulayman (tenor), Sean Shibe (guitar)

Takemitsu: In the Woods - Three pieces for guitar

Work length3:29

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Sean Shibe (guitar)

I. Wainscot Pond

Track length3:29

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

Britten: Songs from the Chinese, Op. 58

Work length11:03

$6.00

$7.80

$10.50

Karim Sulayman (tenor), Sean Shibe (guitar)

No. 1 The Big Chariot

Track length2:00

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

No. 2 The Old Lute

Track length2:47

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

No. 3 The Autumn Wind

Track length1:25

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

No. 4 The Herd-boy

Track length1:30

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

No. 5 Depression

Track length2:05

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

No. 6 Dance Song

Track length1:16

$1.00

$1.30

$1.75

About
Reviews
Explore

About

Interview, Karim Sulayman on Broken Branches

5th July 2023

Tenor Karim Sulayman talks about his recently-released eclectic album of works for guitar and voice with Sean Shibe.

Recording of the Week, Broken Branches from Karim Sulayman and Sean Shibe

12th May 2023

The Lebanese-American tenor and Scottish guitarist join forces for a multifaceted yet deeply personal recital, that ranges across cultural and geographical boundaries and explores the idea of diaspora in music.

Tenor Karim Sulayman and guitarist Sean Shibe present Broken Branches, a conceptual album with music ranging from Dowland, Monteverdi, Britten, Rodrigo, Takemitsu, Harvey, and Chaker to traditional songs from the Middle East, scrutinizing the close cultural and musical ties between East and West. This musical exploration ties in with the artists’ personal experience of a dynamic, in-between identity, as they grew up in the West having ethnic roots in the East (Lebanon and Japan respectively). Broken Branches explores the wood of the guitar and its relatives, as well as the splintering of history known as diaspora. Karim Sulayman has garnered international attention as a sophisticated and versatile artist, and won a Grammy Award for Classical Solo Vocal in 2019. Multi-award-winning guitarist Sean Shibe brings a fresh and innovative approach to the traditional classical guitar, while also exploring contemporary music and repertoire for electric guitar. He continues his exclusive collaboration with PENTATONE after his well received Camino(2021) and Lost & Found (2022).

Reviews

July 2023

Shibe brings a lively charisma and a vibrant array of musical colour to the album, conjuring everything from 17th-century lute to Arabic oud across this wide-reaching programme. Sulayman’s performance at times feels too restrained, but his interpretation of Britten’s Songs f rom the Chinese ha s a wonderful piquancy and dynamism, and brings this thoughtful release to a rewarding close.

June 2023

It’s a thoughtful and idiosyncratic project, one carried through in several arrangements and realisations by the two musicians that blur the line between song and art song into something broadly ‘folkish’.

12th May 2023

The main idea that Shibe and Sulayman play around with throughout this album is the contrast between exoticised, garbled or merely half-remembered Western portrayals of the Eastern Mediterranean and East Asia..The anonymous La prima vez has a simple plaintiveness, for which Sulayman’s unfussy voice – light, with rapid but unobtrusive vibrato – and Shibe’s gentle accompaniment are perfect.

29th April 2023

an eclectic album, built on friendship, which explores the performers’ own sense of identity, memory, diaspora, often in their own arrangements...Sulayman, a Lebanese-American singer, light-voiced and flexible, brings intensity to traditional Sephardic song, and new inflections to John Dowland, Claudio Monteverdi and Benjamin Britten (his six songs from the Chinese).

Broken Branches

CD

Downloads

Contents

Interview, Karim Sulayman on Broken Branches

Recording of the Week, Broken Branches from Karim Sulayman and Sean Shibe

Download queue