Brothers, songwriters, and collaborators, Daniel and Patrick Lazour have released their independently-produced album Flap My Wings: Songs from We Live in Cairo, on the tenth anniversary of the Tahrir Square protests that began the Egyptian Revolution in 2011.
Flap My Wings: Songs from We Live in Cairo, featuring songs from their musical, the Richard Rodgers Award-winning We Live in Cairo, seen in the Spring of 2019 at the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is now available via iTunes or Spotify (click to download).
Virtually gathering an extraordinary group of artists from across the globe during the current coronavirus pandemic, the remotely recorded album features artists from the cast of the musical as well as major Arab activist-songwriters, including Ramy Essam, Emel Mathlouthi, Rotana, Hadi Eldebeck, Hamed Sinno, Naseem Alatrash, and the brothers themselves.
In addition to the artists heard on the album, acclaimed Egyptian artist Ganzeer has created the album artwork and a special animation of the title track, Flap My Wings. Animation & Art Direction is by Paul MacLachlan.
Flap My Wings is written by the Lazours, arranged by Madeline Smith with additional orchestrations by Michael Starobin, produced by Robin Buyer, and performed by the Lazours (vocals and guitar), Naseem Alatrash (cello), Bengisu Gökçe (violin), John Murchison (qanun and bass), Jeremy Smith (percussion), and Madeline Smith (keyboard).
Flap My Wings: Songs From We Live in Cairo is executive produced by Madeleine Foster Bersin; music supervision and selected arrangements by Madeline Smith; album art by Ganzeer; conceived with Taibi Magar; music production, sound engineering, and mixing by Robin Buyer; mastering by Ryan Schwabe; with additional orchestrations by Michael Starobin and percussion direction by Jeremy Smith. Flap My Wings: Songs From We Live in Cairo, written by the Lazours, was recorded remotely and at Pulse Music (NYC).
Flap My Wings: Songs from We Live in Cairo was supported by The American Repertory Theater at Harvard University (Diane Paulus, Artistic Director; Diane Borger, Executive Producer) where the stage production of We Live in Cairo had its world premiere on May 22, 2019.