Ramadaniyyat: The Handover - Aly Eissa, Ayman Asfour, and Jonas Cambien

This concert in Abu Dhabi brings together three musicians under the name The Handover: Egyptian composer and oud player Aly Eissa, Alexandrian violinist Ayman Asfour and the Belgian/Norwegian keyboardist Jonas Cambien. It is staged as part of the Ramadaniyyat programme and belongs to the Arabic events strand, a live set rather than a conventional recital.

The trio sets out to link the ritual music and folk traditions of rural Egypt and the Nile Delta with modern improvisation. Their sound draws on krautrock riffs, psychedelic shaabi and the raw energy of 1960s avant-garde jazz, built on the hypnotic, trance-inducing repetition typical of Delta music. Classical training, urban shaabi and countryside ritual melodies meet in one sound that feels both old and futuristic. Their debut, released in 2025 on the cult label Sublime Frequencies, was singled out as one of that label's standout releases. The group has spent two years touring major international stages, including Jazzfest Berlin, Rewire and a WOMEX showcase, and arrives in the UAE after releasing a second album in 2026.

The concert takes place in The Black Box Theater at The Arts Center at NYU Abu Dhabi, on Saadiyat Island. Saadiyat is the capital's cultural district, home to major museums and galleries and to a university campus, and it also has beaches. A black box theatre is a flexible, intimate room, which suits music built on improvisation and close listening. For residents of Dubai, the island is a drive of roughly an hour to an hour and a half, so it works as an evening trip.

This is a night for listeners who like music that is hard to file under one genre: fans of Arabic folk and oud, of psychedelic and krautrock sounds, or of experimental jazz. Expect a concert focused on the music itself, with an improvised, trance-like feel in which the set carries on rising rather than settling back down.