Musician Pezhham Akhavass will perform at the World Percussion Art Festival, an international event in San Francisco, California, where renowned international artists perform their traditional music, July 21-22.
According to the Persian website of Mehr News Agency, Akhavass will play daf and tonbak, two traditional Iranian percussion instruments.
Other musicians participating will include Japanese drummers Yoshikazu Fujimoto and his wife Yoko Fujimoto from the world famous music group Kodo; Abbas Kasimov, a member of Zakir Hussain’s “Masters of Percussion” ensemble from Uzbekistan as well as percussionist Faisal Zedan from Syria.
Akhavass, 38, who was tutored in tonbak at the age of five by maestro Nasser Farhangfar (1947-1997), also plays setar, oud, tanbur and other percussions like daf and the Indian tabla.
He studied music at Soureh University of Tehran and then went to the University of San Francisco for advanced learning in music.
Akhavass has performed in many musical tours and notable festivals in Morocco, France, Italy, Sweden and Austria, and has released outstanding pieces in collaboration with distinguished musicians.
Last year he released an album titled “Then” in collaboration with Azerbaijani Kamancheh player Imamyar Hasanov. The album was ranked 27 in the Transglobal World Music Chart, published in February.
Pezhham has also toured, performed and recorded with masters in Persian music namely Shahram Nazeri, Hossein Alizadeh and Saeid Farajpouri. He is based in San Francisco where he teaches tonbak, daf and setar. He also works on different musical productions, gives lectures and demonstrations in Persian music besides directing his production company Akhavass Productions.
