From the liner notes to Alight:

Safa
(Farsi): inner purity, sincerity, sincere affection

Amir Koushkani, François Houle and Sal Ferreras are Safa. Three players brought together by good fortune and a deep love for music and the art of improvisation.

Inspired by the profound passion of an ancient Persian repertoire, drawn into the realm of memory, evocation and delight, these three individuals bring to this disc contemporary improvisations and neo-traditional settings that unfold in rhythmic play and timbral contrasts. The works contained herein are at times playful, at times humorous, and at other times imbued with an intense rapture that delivers us into another world from which to view the beauty of our own gift of life.

François is a master of invention whose palette seems inexhaustible. His clarinet brings forth transformations of powerful ingenuity and keen musical instinct. I see it as my role to provide a magic carpet ride, a rich pulse to propel the flights of the trio as a whole, a rhythmic counterpoint to launch surprising adventures.

Let this musical debut stand as an offering to our loved ones with which we reaffirm their constant source of inspiration.
-Sal Ferreras

The music of Safa is representative of the great diversity of experience of its members. But even though some of the works are more connected to other traditions, such as Turkish music ("Nihawend Lunga") and Judeo-Arabic music ("Ninavae"), the moods and feelings of Persian music are the guiding light throughout this CD.

The first time I was exposed to this music was when I listened to Amir's CD Quest. His voice gave me goose bumps and his playing of the tar was a revelation to me in its ability to communicate the deepest of emotions. His live performances and other recordings, most notably his self-produced duo with legendary Persian classical singer Khatereh Parvaneh (In the Path of Love), have confirmed my initial impression that his musicality knows no boundary.

Sal is a master alchemist, able to transform a simple idea into a complex and passionate declamation. In music as in life he sets forces in motion. His energy, creativity, and ingenuity have been a great source of inspiration.

To make music with these two outstanding musicians is a constant source of joy and wonder. A riff may transform itself into an extensive composition, complete with poetry, structure, counterpoint, and harmonic and melodic development. A simple theme may suggest many others, in turn interweaving themselves into suites where there is ample space to express onself. This constant flow of ideas is generated from an improvisational space, in lieu of a primarily compositional one. This gives the music a sense of openness that allows compositional aspects to be forged and built upon by the imagination.

"Drunk" is all improvisation built around Amir's incantation of a Sufi poem. "Aurora", "Shadi" and "Epilogue" are duo improvisations where each pairing partakes in evocative dialogues. The remaining works are strongly inspired by the Persian tradition if not outright based in it. "Chahar Mezrab" is by one of the greatest masters of the Persian Radif and is the most virtuosic piece on the program; it is through-composed apart from my clarinet solo. "Sufinameh" and "Saghinameh" are based on classic Persian poems and themes adapted or composed by Amir and arranged with the group. "Whisper of Love" is a contemporary Persian composition and poem. "Navae" is an improvisation culminating in the trio's unison playing of a riff composed by Amir for our very first get together in 1999.
-François Houle

Music is a universal language. Anyone, in any part of the world, who gets involved with this art knows that music has to fill the heart, soul and spirit of the musician completely for the music to become the expression of the spirit. After this stage, as Moulana Jelaluddin Rumi says,

the musician learns that a common language of the heart is far superior to a common language of the tongue.

After several years of study and work in Persian music, fate took me far away from my homeland and the roots of my music. I found myself in a country where various cultures and traditions come together and I was given the opportunity to perhaps communicate with others through the language of music.

Fortunately I was not alone in this, and the attention to world music in the city of Vancouver, where I live, made it possible to become closer to other musicians with similar interests living in this land. The standard way to perform Persian music is solo, duo or in a very small group (for example voice, one instrument and percussion), and one of its typical structuring devices is call and response. In fact this form of communication was very important and was prevalent among traditional musicians in Iran. In my first encounter with musicians from other cultures here I realized that using call and response might be a good starting point for combining the music of different lands. Of course the performance style of each musician differs, depending on their understanding of the music and the possibilities of the instrument played. I have to admit that I encountered musicians whose feeling and understanding of music and skills of performance was so developed that we could start our musical conversations with the introduction of only a few melodies. After a limited number of practice sessions with François and Sal we became so intimate spiritually that we decided to share this complex experience with others, an experience which would not have happened without music.

A music that can be nourishment for the soul was my first priority; and of course the versatility and the possibilities within the music of my country enabled me to respond to certain new musical thoughts and feelings. My performance here is the result of this interaction, filled with deep respect and affection for the music and performance of my fellow musicians.
-Amir Koushkani