{"id":109,"date":"2026-02-05T15:16:25","date_gmt":"2026-02-05T14:16:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maisonchill.co\/journal\/?p=109"},"modified":"2026-06-11T21:46:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-11T19:46:09","slug":"music-as-refuge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maisonchill.co\/journal\/en\/music-as-refuge\/","title":{"rendered":"Music as refuge"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Music has always been there. Not as a backdrop, but as a presence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I can still see myself as a child, sitting beside my father, fascinated by a vinyl record spinning on an orange record player. That faint crackle before the sound arrived, that suspended moment, almost more important than the music itself. Even then, something was happening in the waiting, in the perception.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Very early on, without yet being able to put it into words, I understood that music was not a single language. It was a way of inhabiting the world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What Comes Before<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

In my family, music was never an isolated practice. It was part of life itself. Women and men sang, played, passed things on: the bendir, the flute, voices answering one another. Ancient songs, almost like those of the griots, carrying history, memory and tradition.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I remember bodies in motion at weddings and baptisms, my grandfathers singing and dancing. Music was not something one listened to; it was something one lived. Looking back, that is probably where it all began.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Without yet being able to articulate it, music was becoming a way of reading the world. It was what led me to music journalism before expanding into culture, then lifestyle and fashion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Before Naming Things<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Before I even chose, I listened.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The voices of Oum Kalthoum, Farid El Atrache and Abdel Halim Hafez settled into the space with an almost architectural depth. Then came Georges Brassens and Jacques Brel, another way of expressing things, more direct, more embodied in words.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And between the two, there was the music of everyday life, the music we do not choose but that passes through us anyway: on the radio, on television, in the most ordinary places.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What Travels<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Over time, my listening expanded. Certain kinds of music have always moved me immediately, almost instinctively, as though they were speaking directly to something deeper.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chinese music, Brazilian music, Malian music, Italian music \u2014 especially that timeless Italian pop \u2014 Lebanese music, and of course Egyptian music. Different languages, different rhythms, yet the same ability to reach what is essential.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And yet many of the artists who have marked me most deeply are American, often African American, because there is an intensity there, a way of transforming experience into music, that has always resonated with me.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thresholds<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

As a child, Michael Jackson was one of those certainties. First Billie Jean, then Thriller, seen live. At that moment, music moved beyond sound to become image, movement and phenomenon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Later, other figures emerged: Prince, D\u2019Angelo, Bilal, J Dilla… another kind of writing, more inward, more free.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Physical Expression<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Music was physical, too. Hip-hop, with Grandmaster Flash, breakdancing, that way of inhabiting the body differently.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And then there were certain energies, like AC\/DC and their raw intensity, or The Police and The Beach Boys, with their immediate, almost sunlit joy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Later, at university, the night became another territory. House, garage and techno entered the picture, with DJs such as Laurent Garnier, and later Moodymann and Theo Parrish, carrying us through until the early hours of the morning.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What Remains<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Jazz arrived differently, almost naturally. Miles Davis, Charlie Parker and Sarah Vaughan became an inner space, a form of balance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And then there was Louis Armstrong. I could not tell you when I first heard him, but his voice made an immediate impression. A warmth, a humanity, a way of conveying emotion like a caress.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Neo soul followed with the same sense of inevitability. D\u2019Angelo, Erykah Badu, Maxwell and their more organic, more inhabited sound remain among the artists that move me the most.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over time, some of the musicians I listened to became faces, then presences. Artists I was fortunate enough to meet, spend time with and sometimes count among those close to me, such as Rachid Taha, Roy Hargrove, Ren\u00e9e Neuville and others. What I admire in them goes beyond talent: it is their way of inhabiting music.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Going Further<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

I have always searched, listened and dug deeper.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The names I mention are well known. But my listening was also shaped elsewhere: in more confidential scenes, lesser-known productions, places where sound is approached differently.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Artists such as Madlib, Floating Points, Theo Parrish, Nujabes, but also Shabaka Hutchings, Yussef Dayes, Robert Glasper and Kamaal Williams.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A more demanding kind of listening, almost a way of learning to hear differently.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What Escapes Words<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Over time, I came to understand that what I was feeling was not only intuitive. Music truly acts upon us. It activates areas of the brain associated with emotion and memory, which explains why a song can instantly bring back an entire feeling. It influences heart rate, breathing and stress levels.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But beyond these mechanisms, something remains elusive. Because it does not pass through language, it reaches directly what often remains inaccessible within us. A quieter place. A deeper place. Almost a spiritual one.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Music does not tell.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It reveals what we do not always manage to name,<\/p>\n\n\n\n

yet recognise immediately.<\/p>\n\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Music has always been there. Not as a backdrop, but as a presence.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-109","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-scenes-souls-en"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maisonchill.co\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maisonchill.co\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maisonchill.co\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maisonchill.co\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maisonchill.co\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=109"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/maisonchill.co\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":215,"href":"https:\/\/maisonchill.co\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109\/revisions\/215"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maisonchill.co\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=109"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maisonchill.co\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=109"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maisonchill.co\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=109"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}