Ya Sharr Mout is an audio-visual performance by Mahmoud Turkmani and Michael Spahr with texts by Nadia Tuéni.
Depending on the Arab pronounciation Ya Sharr Mout either means «Oh, Evil, Die» or «Son of a Bitch». The Lebanese Swiss composer, guitar and
oud player Mahmoud Turkmani was called a «son of a bitch» by certain Arab musicologists when he tried to re-new Arab classical music.
Therefore he started to compose a new piece called Ya Sharr Mout.
Mahmoud Turkmani tried to write words which express the topic taboo in the Arabic language in a
cancer-like way or backwards. Thus he came upon an amazing phenomenon: If the letters of
a word are written backwards (or from the word centre backwards) they invent
themselves again and again and there are astonishing results (e.g. the sense of a word
turns into its contrary/antonym). He then started to compose music in the same way.
Michael Spahr also started to play around with words and created an audio-visual calligraphic backdrop for the composition of Turkmani.
Ya Sharr Mout opened in Beirut (Lebanon) in October 2007. In 2008 it was shown in Switzerland: Biennale Bern, Theaterspektakel Zurich,
Kino Riff Raff Zurich, Architekturforum Zurich and Les Jardins Musicaux Cernier.
The acclaimed Swiss film director Sabine Gisiger (Dschoint Ventschr, Swiss Broadcast Corporation DRS) has
directed a documentary movie about the project Ya Sharr Mout and the life of Mahmoud Turkmani. The film was shown on Swiss TV.
The DVD/CD, which has been designed by Michael Spahr, has been released on Enja Records.
