September 9, 1995
From Correspondent Walter Rodgers
JERUSALEM, Israel (CNN) -- Yves Touati, a French Jew, leads three Russian Orthodox nuns into a darkened alley. It is a most improbable rendezvous. The nuns aren't in any danger; the alley leads to the only entrance of a recording studio. It is the nuns' first recording session and the first time they have sung outside of their convent (60k AIFF sound).
Touati collects and records ancient music from convents and monasteries in the Holy Land. He believes the music there is so pure it should be taken into the world.
The nuns communicate with Touati using several languages, trying to find a common bond. Out of their cloistered walls, the nuns are decidedly uncomfortable. Mother Olympic admits that the noisy atmosphere of the recording studio was a more than a little distracting. "We were very nervous ... were not used to all the microphones and people running around."
Before Touati rounded up nuns for holy recording sessions, he was a rock 'n' roll musician. Now, ancient Christian music is his passion. "Music is, by definition, an act of love. And when you get to (the) love for God with good music, then you can find something bigger and stronger and even untemporal (264k AIFF sound)."
After his session with the nuns, Touati has an appointment to hear monks in an Armenian church. It is the music of another world, a world plunged into the darkness after the collapse of the Roman Empire. It is the biphonic music of monks waiting in the desert for the Kingdom of God.
Father Elysee, and Orthodox priest, acknowledges that the music is as esoteric as a monk's calling. "If at least some people, a very infinitesimal percentage of the people who hear this music, have a genuine spiritual experience through it, it is worth it (179k AIFF sound)."
The monks sing their praises to God and it is music (136k AIFF sound), with its roots in ancient Persia and Arabia, that is a communion beyond bread and wine. It is a communion of the soul and spirit.
A bond was formed between this French Jew, who records and preserves sacred music, and the monks he courts and persuades to sign recording contracts. "All the music I produced or composed or played or sing, always after three or four months it was already out of fashion," Touati says. "With this production of liturgical music, I have the feeling of producing forever."
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