Finding Home:

This album is a journey through memories and towards the essence of home, both within and without. The music moves through loss, transcendence and magic, with a final arrival in a hopeful place. Home: literally, emotionally and spiritually, however that may look for you. Home is that place of peace, that place of softness, of comfort, and of healing. It manifests in many different ways for many different people. It’s finding home in nature. It's finding home in those that make us feel that sense of relief and peace.

Funny enough, for me, finding home is also about losing home. In order to find a new definition of home, I had to go through mourning for a homeland, for a world we'll never see again. I never got a chance to say goodbye. The loss of that world was heart-wrenching and, in a way, steered me towards a universal concept of home in the most spiritual sense.

I wrote this album over three years, during a time of spiritual awakening for me. It's only by embarking on that journey of constant meditation and finding home within God that I could begin to feel consoled, to feel that I have my own home within me. I felt that the world is my home and humanity is my home.

When I write, I simply pray that the Creator makes me an instrument for his or her peace. Even though some of the tracks were written as a response to loss and grief, my prayer is that this album brings you joy and healing.

Love,

Maya Youssef

Jasmine Bayati: To an Earth Angel

I wrote this piece of music as a joyful bouquet of jasmine given in gratitude to the Earth angels who help others selflessly without expecting anything in return. Being in the presence of these benevolent people always makes me feel at home. They helped during dark times and brought so much comfort, so much light and so much joy.

Jasmine is the symbol of my beloved city of Damascus, and Bayati is the maqam (Arabic melodic mode or scale) used in this piece of music. ‘Yasmin dimashqi’ means ‘Damascene jasmine’; the title ‘Jasmine Bayati’ is my play on words.