J O H N N Y F A R R A J

Johnny Farraj studied Arabic percussion with Michel Merhej Baklouk (Fairouz's veteran percussionist) and Karim Nagi, the oud with Simon Shaheen and Bassam Saba, and classical Arabic singing with Rima Khcheich and Youssef Kassab. He attended the Arabic Music Retreat for 6 consecutive years, and has performed with Simon Shaheen/Qantrara and Najib Shaheen. He performed on Maqams of Baghdad by Safaafir featuring Amir El-Saffar, and recorded on the soundtrack of the play "9 Parts of Desire" by Heather Raffo. Johnny created the maqamworld.com web site to teach classical Arabic music (maqam) theory, and has taken part in many lectures and demonstrations on that subject in universities and museums in the US and Canada. Recently Johnny recorded Arabic music tracks for the award-winning documentary "Jimmy Carter - Man From Plains" by Jonathan Demme, and will appear in Demme's 2008 feature film "Dancing With Shiva".