We are thrilled to announce the 5 selected artists who will participate in our 7-week workshop program that starts in October.

Esmail Bnoae

Esmail Bnaoe is a singer and musician from the north of Syria, currently studying classical Ottoman and Anatolian folk music at the Codarts Conservatory in Rotterdam. Esmail’s musical journey started at a young age in his village mosque where he got trained in religious chanting rituals. The local folklore music has influenced his musicality and is the continuous source of his inspiration.

“I’ve been on an inspiring journey of self-learning, exploring the depths of electronic music and honing my skills in producing and designing unique sounds with Ableton. Music has been my lifelong dream, and becoming a music producer has always been my ultimate goal. Now, I’m eager to take my sound and story to the next level with professional guidance and support.”

DJ Shahmaran (Arjîn Elgersma) have been exploring different facets of club music over the past five years, developing a taste for breakbeat rhythms carried through a variety of sub bass heavy genres. As an overall artist and aspiring music producer, they are interested and influenced by the intersections of queerness and non-western lineages of deconstructed club music.

“Because of deconstructed club’s queer roots and influences, I am looking to explore with these workshops how I can combine sounds and instruments found in Turkish/Kurdish music with high energy and percussive dance music productions – of course with a seriously unserious queer touch.”

Celine Bereyakan (Dicle Gülşahin) is a songwriter, producer, and DJ based in Rotterdam making covers and lo-fi beats sampled from Turkish pop music, and composing post-punk songs, all in DIY aesthetics. Her sets consist of the songs from her youth, widely regarded as ‘guilty pleasure’. While nostalgia is an essential dimension of her music; the true core of her practice relies on the musical quality of early samples of Turkish pop that features the authentic sound of the geography.

“During H3ritage Studios program, I’d like to explore the collage as a form of commemoration and musical interpretation, by repurposing samples from popular culture elements from Turkey and around. As a DIY-musician lacking proper musical education, I see the program’s offerings as a great opportunity to improve my vision and skills while learning from the experts and exchanging muses with participating fellows.”

Başak Kırıcı is a storyteller creating audio-visual work with a focus on animation. She studied Fine Arts at AAGSL in Istanbul and Animation at WdKA in Rotterdam. In her work, she experiments with animation and live footage editing, and collaborates with musicians and sound artists.

“In this program I would like to work with sound not as a separate addition to the visuals I create, but as a piece that completes each other and co-exists in harmony. I would like to try out generating sounds from visual input and see if I can compose a musical piece with this technique.”

Q.A.Q (Adam Al Qaq) is a rapper rooted in both Jerusalem and Rotterdam, producing music with political undertones, with the vision of bringing Palestinian stories to the forefront of the music industry. Alongside his music career, he is finishing up his Bachelor studies in Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology.

“Through this program, I want to gain the necessary practical tools and methods that could help towards sampling experimentation and recording techniques. Alongside that, I want to benefit from learning visual tools that I can use within live shows, as well as experimenting with still and moving images to be part of my skill set.”