Projects

Since his early childhood ,Shadi had revealed prodigious skills as a high talented musician and portrait painter. He started painting familiar everyday scenes illustrating people in different personalities and modes, as well as painting locations of rural and mountainous landscapes which he knew intimately.

Mastering caricature was a long and hard struggle and took of him at first a lot of trial and error. Comics, face painting and cartoon sketches were amongst Shadi's earliest artwork pieces , then his handling became more varied , he was impressed by the global political events, and the new social issues and fresh materials of the current political and social era like cyber world ,consumerism and globalization .

From close watching of the unjust world around him, and under the inspiration of the late Naji Al Ali drawings (he was and still a lifelong admirer of Handala symbol ) he viewed subjects from uncommon viewpoints that provide an ironic ,yet humane commentary on different social motifs and life themes.

Shadi used a style that reveals a deep understanding of space color and shading techniques through a profound graphic language based on the knowledge that he acquired through training. He had participated in many local forums and exhibitions, and had worked as a caricaturist for Aloroba Syrian local newspaper. And now he's looking for creative animation of his drawings in the wide world of digital media which can endow his artworks with a sense of movement and vitality.

Shadi has shared his ambitious energizing oud talent throughout the Rababa music scene. Knowing the limited potentials of classical Rababa and the lack of it's musicology and historic repertoire which caused the scarcity of traditional-based Rababa recordings (In fact, numerous sources from simple Bedouin heritage is not the perfect source to depend on ) ; Shadi took an audacious step forward by using it (and other traditional instruments and old handcrafted materials) in many different ways, exploring all of their possibilities and translating various world traditions into their own languages and techniquesm as well as adding new styles and rhythmic patterns that mixes modern and old-timely music into a swirl of creation and passion.

These new styles of playing were admired by many, in the musically-gifted young circuits, and were sought after by many prominent artists .. a sweet band was formed in the early 2005 "Sinbad" was founded with a select handful of Rababa players , they bond as a unit of synergy ,friendship and artistic creativity [wmv].. Since that Shadi has concentrated on transcribing and arranging musical pieces that can work for its lonely ,yet splendid string ...

".. Although Rababa does not upgrade to a name of modern musical instrument in our days for its lack for technical perfection . but it still has a deep warm sound ..the depth of mankind ancient history and above all it has a grief that fears the past and its sublime glory and tempts us to redraw the bow across its lonely old string and listening to an instrument that once had been a grandfather to the marvelous violin family .."

Rababa has a captivating sound, pure and naïve and tinged with the kind of faint melancholy that can be found in rough and poor areas ,its original homeland . But the deplorable reality is that handling Rababa music is still done in backward and irresponsible approaches , besides other negative playing aspects of monotony ,primitivism and resemblance ..

Sinbad is the well-known sailor character of "The Thousand Nights and a Night " stories and it's a gesture to the band's grand goal of touring and traveling throughout the world showing a clear ,novel and progressive oriental musical styles and manners ,something totally different of those prejudged and false views and conceptions regarding the present eastern artistic and cultural status ..

It's difficult to make a convincing, compelling big group of traditional instruments in a musical performance , maintaining in the same time the unison lines between the amateur players . Making such a performance exciting , musically and visually is one of Shadi's ventures that deserves a lot of effort and hard work .

Also Shadi had launched a wonderful project of composing Rababa Method , the first project of its kind in the Middle east ,in addition to teaching musical theory principles and playing in local culture centers in an ardent and intimate ambiance ,stressing that musicology and practicing are completely required to maintain the minimum skills needed to master a pro playing..