Kamal Musallam

Born in Kuwait on June 8 1970, from very artistic parents, Kamal showed unique talents for drawing and playing music from the early age of 3. He started learning guitar at the age of 9 but took it more seriously when he was 17. Kamal was educated as architect and has went through various musical experiences throughout his young age and college times; of which were Arabic bands, Flamenco, Rock and Blues bands. Late 80's to early 90's, he started discovering more of Jazz sounds and got to know Pat Metheny, Miles Davis, George Benson, John McLaughlin, Al Di Meola, among many others. In 1994 he moved to France, where he experienced another true musical atmosphere for four years, attending festivals and concerts in both France and Switzerland. He met artists from all over Europe and the world. There he created a more obvious interest for jazz, and developed his playing style. In 1997 he moved back for one year in Lebanon to work as architect; during which he met Ziad Rahbani and started to be a part of his ensemble. There he was convinced his real passion was music and nothing but that, and had to make a serious decision about his career, either to be an architect or a musician, and he chose to explore the musical world. That decision demanded a second trip to France to explore more into the core of the music industry. Kamal’s final return to settle in Jordan, led him to establish his own label K&G and to produce his first album ON A JORDAN RIVER’S SIDE, 2003. It was followed by Out Of MY CITY, 2008, LULU, 2009, SONGS FOR SEUNG-EUN, 2011, THE BEST OF KAMAL MUSALLAM, 2012, HOMEMADE IN ROME, 2014, and WORLD PEACE TRIO, 2017 and HANDMADE IN HUMMUS, 2020. A new collaboration with Billy Cobham, Kai Eckhardt and Gary Husband, among others, is still in production process and falls under the new project entitled "EastMania", expected to be released in 2022. Kamal is settled in Dubai since 2002, active locally and internationally as performer and producer. His main touring bands are Kamal Musallam Trio, Lulu Project, and EastMania. Other collaborations perform occasionally as World Peace Trio, with Gilad Atzmon and Dwiki Dharmawan, and Sea Of Strings, with Dominic Miller (longtime STING's right hand), and Jason Carter. Musallam is currently playing the nylon Silent guitar™ and the newly developed Trans-Acoustic models by YAMAHA, the electric Multi-Oud by GODIN. In 2017, he had developed with IBANEZ his signature guitar models, the electric KMM1 and the nylon fretless KMA1 both released in 2010, and later the high end electric model KMM100 released in 2014, all with a dedicated “quarter tones” playing facility, opening new horizons for guitarists to experiment with additional sounds non existing on standard guitars. Kamal played along with: STING, George Benson, Billy Cobham, Bobby McFerrin, Bob Franceschini, Randy Brecker, Ada Rovatti, Stanely Jordan, Ranjit Barot, Anne Ducros, Dwiki Dharmawan, Andy Suzuki, David Reinhardt, Jorge Pardo (Paco De Lucia Sextet), Francisco Molina, Israel Varela, Volker Schlott, and many others.