Yazan Sarayrah: "My Journey Back to My Roots Became a Journey of Self-Discovery"

Yazan Sarayrah’s music is rooted in the meeting point between ancient heritage and contemporary electronic sound. Raised within a Bedouin community, he grew up surrounded by the desert’s timeless rhythms and stories, finding his own musical language when he discovered the MIDI controller.

From Sareh to his album Sharq Ettabbana ("East of the Milky Way"), Yazan developed a hypnotic psychedelic electro-rock sound through live looping. His current work expands this vision, blending microtonal textures inspired by Arabic Maqamat and Nabatean poetry with melodic techno.

At its core, Yazan’s music explores identity, belonging and heritage, bringing the stories of his land and its people into a contemporary soundscape. It is both a celebration of native culture and a call to reclaim it beyond the distortions of self-orientalization, while embracing the tension between tradition and modernity.

In "IRTH-TRONIC", the idea of "irth" — heritage — seems to be a central starting point. How has your understanding of cultural heritage evolved from Sharq Ettabbana to this new album?

The biggest shift was my perception of the idea of heritage itself, I found that the more time I spend here the closer I get to where it all started. I just saw what was always there with a new understanding that I needed time to see clearly. I guess I needed time to entertain the young desire to move away and discover new things beyond what I grew up with. And the more I explored the more I started to appreciate what I was trying to move away from. 

You bring Arabic maqamat and microtonal textures into dialogue with the language of melodic techno. When you are writing a track, how do you decide what should remain rooted in tradition and what can be transformed through technology?

Since the framework itself is electronic, with pulsing synths and a steady beat, I wanted to preserve some foundational EDM elements. I wanted the music to remain relevant and understood within that genre, and I didn't want the project to move towards the experimental area simply because of where its musical language comes from. I used microtonality and Arabic Maqamat within the scales and tuning systems of the electronic devices I work with, so they stayed true to their sound but dictated by Arabic tonality.

I also tried to stay away from VSTs that sample traditional instruments. as I have access to these instruments and can record them myself, I wanted their actual playing techniques to remain present. Sometimes a Rababa bow pull might squeal by mistake, and those little mistakes are very important to the sound I wanted to achieve. Capturing authenticity here was much more important for me than presenting perfection. I took the same approach with the vocals, the slight differences in pitch and timing between takes are part of the character I wanted to present. So for me, the technology wasn't there to clean those elements up. It was there to give them a new environment to exist in. 

Nabataean poetry, historical figures, and landmarks from your region play an important role in your work. Is there a particular story, place, or historical figure connected to "IRTH-TRONIC" that feels especially personal to you?

The one that is especially personal to me is a poem I used on the first two tracks of the album, each time with a different arrangement and Hjeni style ("Hjeni", a collection of melodic recitation styles of Nabati poetry). It was written by a mother, capturing her longing and concern for her son, who was leading the Jordanian 40th Armored Brigade on the Golan Heights front alongside the Syrians during the 1973 war.

What makes it especially personal to me is that, at that time, my late father was serving under the command of her son, General Khaled Hajhouj Al-Majali. The poem also makes a direct mention of Al-Karak, where both the Majali and Sarayrah tribes come from. So there is a direct connection between this poem and a part of my own family’s history.

The poem itself reads:

I crossed the borders of Syria, searching for the one my heart holds dear.

O guardian of the checkpoint, open the way, a visitor from Al-Karak, I have arrived.

Call for Khaled, behind the doors, the spring of my heart, its blooming flower.

A proud commander of the army, commanding his soldiers against their foes.

You grew up within a Bedouin community and discovered the MIDI controller as a new way of expressing the rhythms you encountered in the desert. After years of working with electronic music, do you see tradition more as something to preserve, or as something that must constantly be reinvented?

I believe that whatever stays still risks the fate of becoming obsolete. Adapting to change is key to survival, and that applies to traditions and heritage as well. In order for them to survive through time and reach future generations, they need to evolve and remain relevant to the different environments they pass through without losing their core foundations. That can only happen when the people who truly belong to that heritage, understand its core values, and aren’t resistant to change are the ones guiding its evolution.

That’s what I wanted to do with this album. It’s my humble attempt to explore our heritage through a sonic identity I deeply appreciate, which is electronic music. It’s also a statement of belonging to where I come from, and to the values and traditions I was raised to honor and respect.

You have spoken about reclaiming cultural identity from the perspective of the land’s native people, without falling into self-orientalizing representations. How do you navigate the tension between bringing your own culture into the global electronic music scene and avoiding the temptation to present it as something "exotic"?

There's no temptation to present it in any way other than what it actually is: a cultural sonic dialogue between art forms that I appreciate, from my personal point of view. I didn't want one side to take over the conversation. I wanted each side to exist authentically, without trying to hide its true self, with all its imperfections and characteristics. Exploring a sonic meeting point between the two, coming as they are, without masks to please the other.

I'm not looking at my heritage as something unfamiliar and trying to make it interesting for someone else. It's something I belong to, something I've grown up around and then came back to with a different perspective. I'm just exploring it through a different form of music that I deeply appreciate.

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