Using music as a cultural bridge
Gio Israel is a Brooklyn-based and Jerusalem-born producer, DJ, and cultural bridge builder. Throughout over 20 years of travel, Gio has been collecting rituals, sounds, and practices from around the world. Besides a rich musical career exploring sound as a DJ, Gio is leading and teaching retreats globally connecting ancient modalities and practices to the modern lifestyle.
He is a certified meditation instructor and a Sema-Zen in the Mevlevi Sufi order. He’s also the former Vice President of Midburn in the Middle East (Burning Man’s 2nd largest regional event in the world) and is the Co-founder of Frequency, a New York-based company creating immersive experiences that raise human consciousness where Gio works closely with leading teachers and wisdom keepers. The following words are an excerpt from an essay he shared on his experiences recording this sample pack.
Producing music, I’m always drawn to organic sounds. I usually record sounds on my travels (I also write a lot of my music on planes in my tours). With time, I grew appreciative and more aware of the therapeutic aspect music has, the fact that specific frequencies can alter our state of mind; that there are specific musical instruments designed to elevate the human spirit.
As part of my work, I meet many spiritual teachers from various traditions. I participate regularly in ceremonies and was honored to be initiated and recognized by several spiritual orders. Music is always there, and it’s always music that’s used as a means to bring people together, closer to themselves and to each other.
As a DJ, I’m constantly searching for that fine balance between creating that tribal, communal, fun feeling of us coming together on the dance floor but also making sure I convey a meaningful experience. With the years, I came to realize that certain elements can make that happen naturally. The sound of a real percussion drum, beautiful string melodies, human voice, and certain frequencies rooted in our physics and cultural DNA that activate us emotionally. We are all descendants of tribal societies, we all have that bio-acoustic access, and though we don’t always rationally understand how we’re affected by sound, it’s surely present.
Searching for good Middle Eastern samples was never an easy task. I think I spent weeks of my life searching for the right rare recordings to use. Not all of us have access to premium musicians to bring into the studio and record a session. And so, I decided to build a new label, creating comprehensive packs dedicated to those instruments, but also to the master musicians we brought together. Young and old, each carrying a cultural story that’s personal, but also tells the story of the area they come from. We tried to find the sounds that represent the entire Middle Eastern region (an impossible task). Making these sounds accessible—some for the first time ever—in the format of high-quality sound samples.
We recorded over 40 different instruments, some of which are thousands of years old. We’ll release them in about a dozen sample packs titled the “Middle East Essentials.”
On a personal note, music transcends politics, and where politicians have worked hard to divide us, music brings us together, but this is not entirely true. By coming together through music we are carrying a strong political message, we choose hope and love over fear.
If there’s something I learned during the long process of creating this project it’s that truth speaks one language, that all opinions and differences vanish away in the presence of a beautiful note played.
My hope is that our work on this pack will reach the hearts of many. I’m grateful for the great musicians who took part in creating it, my amazing team, Splice for supporting us, and for you for using it. I hope you find it inspiring as we all have.
