Truly exceptional, deeply moving Middle Eastern inspired music from members of Gor and Rajna. The primary inspiration behind the album is Zoroastrianism, the pre-Islamic religion of Persia. The band state that lyrical inspiration comes from 10th century Persian poet Firdausi; whilst he was writing in the Muslim era, his epic Shahnameh describes events surrounding legendary kings and heroes from the Zoroastrian and pre-Zoroastrian eras. The band's name Khvarena is a Zoroastrian concept, usually transliterated as 'khvarenah', meaning 'divine glory'.

The album includes 14 tracks, some instrumental, some sung in Italian and others in an ancient Persian tongue, such as the deeply spiritual Zot, and Zaraqustro, which concerns Zarathushtra's conversion of King Vishtaspa. Musically the album is predominantly based around a traditional Middle Eastern theme, with some secondary influences from medieval European music, including lots of hammered dulcimer and other authentic traditional instruments. The style is sure to delight fans of Dead Can Dance, Rajna, and perhaps also Unto Ashes.

At times they sound so much like DCD that you'd be forgiven for thinking it really was them, especially in the very beautiful and moving track Nabah, which features the sort of wordless 'speaking in tongues' vocal style favoured by that band. However they expand on a theme pioneered by Dead Can Dance, adding something new and creative and reaching the same sort of heights of greatness, instead of sounding like a mere second rate ripoff.

An absolutely astonishing album; I really hope that this is not just a one-off side project as I would love to hear more from this band.

Khvarena is a project of Francesco Banchini (known from Ataraxia and GOR) together with the French medieval folk & ambient worldmusic band Rajna of Janine and Fabrice Lefebvre. Musicwise The Spirit Rises immediately recalls memories of Dead Can Dance, GOR and the recent Arcana. Rajna is a band that is already known for years for their rich musical style referring to Dead Can Dance. Also Francesco Banchini is known being a master in traditional medieval and ethnic music.

On this recording a musical journey is made from the European continent to the countries of the Middle-East. Gracious and majestic, ritualistic and devote, sometimes festive. These are the characteristics of the music on this versatile album. This album delves deeply into the mystical spiritual life in Medieval christian Southern-Europe and the transition to the Arabic Orient. World music with implied passion and grace, available in many spheres and colours.

A very broad selection of instruments is used with flutes, clarinet, guitar, all sorts of percussion and traditional Arabic instruments. Mentioned are the saz, zurna, bendir, riq, derbouka, santoor, medieval flute, tampura, udu, sound bowls, swara tampura, crotal, and the bouzouk.

Lyrics are inspired by a Persian poet from the 10th century: Firdausi. Highlights actually are hard to mention since the recording as a whole is just splendid. And this is only the first part and there is more to come. Yet special mentioning for ‘Khvarena’, ‘Haurunatat’ and the beautifully sung ‘Nabah’ anyway. Sam Rosenthal, known from Projekt records and Black Tape for a Blue Girl, has designed the A5 format digipak DVD cover of this cd, made of hard cardboard, very nicely. This album is extraordinarily beautiful and the year 2007 starts with a musical highlight very early on with this. The Spirit Rises is album special of the month january on Gothtronic.com.

The Spirit Rises is the name Franchesco Banchini from Gor and Jeanne & Fabrice Lefebvre from Rajna have adopted for their new release. Khvarena is the result: a voyage through ethnic sounds, oriental landscapes, primitive percussion, Persian poetry, spirituality and the beginning of Monotheist Religion through the ideas Zaratustra initiated that slipped into all the three main occidental book religions.

To open the record, 'Khvarena' is the ritualistic song that gives name to the record. With a repetitive and crude beginning, where the main instruments are the voice mantra of 'Khvarena', percussion and some chord instruments; the song grows in strength and impetus, as if it were fed by the sole energy of the word. There is a bass wind instrument that remains in the background and gives deepth to the song, surrounding it and caressing the primitiveness of the percussion and voice since the start. As the composition gains intensity, another wind instruments appears and fights with the voice for protagonism, transporting the listener far into oriental lands. 'Zot' follows, and opens with much more tranquility and calmness. The sound is also modernized: the combination of the percussion, wind, and voice is not one that belongs to traditional composition. These are the fruits that Gor and Rajna have always brought. The possibility of reviving an old spirit into new times, only by means of music. The presentation of a sound that is easily recognized as contemporary yet dips its roots into the seas of time to that place that vibrates in a forgotten place in the heart. The song is an offering, a prayer, and it's the profound sincerity of the voice that rings honest. The flute work is excellent, sober and ascetic. It seems the song could go on forever, for the gods would listen to those that made the longest and hardest sacrifice.

The range of instruments these maestros use is wide and varied. They can prize themselves in being exquisite musicians, and, especially, in having searched to be as honest as possible in the use of traditional and classical instruments. Clarinet, Saz, Zurna, Bendir, Riq, Derbouka, Santoor, medieval flute, tampura, udu, singing bowls, swara tampura, crotal, bouzoki... the list of names is long, and the preparation for the actual recording of a song has to be long and pondered.

'Sultan' brings the opaque voice of Jeanne into a song of great beauty and intimacy. The instruments accompany the voice, playfully answering to her words, the way butterflies flutter around each other in spring days full of longing. A short and intense song of yearning and delicacy, that can bring the old 'Cántigas' or 'Villancicos' to mind - the early and primitive poetry composition sung in the voice of woman in different languages. 'Ray of Sun' follows overflowing with chord instruments in a brief melody.

'Raggio di Sole' returns to a full-grown song. The harmonics they manage to present through all three voices is enviable, reminding me personally of some of Ô Paradis' composition counting with Nôvy Svèt's front man, except it walks on the sands of time taking the folk elements deep into time's tunnels... And, of course, including the sweet feminine secondary voices of Jeanne.

Stepping into a sensual world where the five senses awake to the smell of incense and the tenuous light of fire, 'Haurunatat' creates, through suave percussion and opaque wind instruments, a feminine world of straightforward poetry; of feelings, accusations and mercy. 'Zaraqustro' is next, giving a cushion of music to a free voice composition that very well could have presented itself naked. A prayer, perhaps, or a petition. The introduction of secondary feminine voices and recited words as a sort of chorus brings the composition into the modern world, giving more importance to the base line, but makes the song loose its genuine sounding, dragging it into a darker and more complex universe.

'Taiyi' is a ritual composition where different voice lines intertwine and recite into the dusk and a desperate claim. It is perhaps the most experimental song of the record, where the wind instrument simply gives brief notes as a background and that changes at different moment into a 'crescendo', a completely different song, full of energy and secrets. The arrangements include sounds and modifications that have highly visual significance, making 'Taiyi' a potential soundtrack for a wandering imagination. 'Hotar' returns to an easier composition, with a very melodic pop feeling to it, where the voice carries much of the weight and a light percussion becomes the inevitable fall-back. The leitmotiv, originally introduced by a wind instrument at the beginning of the song is powerful, and accompanies the composition into a jazz-like feeling all through 'Hotar'. The feminine voice also carries the melody of 'Nabah' in a rich and luscious song full of percussion, various instruments, choruses, whispers, rustles and chants. To close, 'L'Anima s'innalza' is a minimal sounding composition, where different lines of percussion are slowly introduced to create a whole, a slight melody develops where a dim man's voice chants and recites.

Most of the songs are short and compact. The Spirit Rises refuses to fall into repetition of a formula for this work. When the song would normally fold over itself, they mostly simply decide to finish it. Most of the lyrics are inspired by the 10th Century Persian poet Firadausi, writer of the famous epic of Iran history and mythology, ‘Shâhnâmeh’, from a time when it was Europe that lived in the dark ages and the Muslim countries where envied for their studies, techniques and advances in medicine, mathematics and philosophy, to mention a few of the disciplines. A meeting point for Occident and Orient, the spices and silk route was a main focal point for all knowledge, its sharing and its exchange and an example of tolerance. Times have change in many ways and for many different things, but 'Khvarana' will take you to a land where promises were not yet broken, where beliefs of secret lands, worlds and gods where not a contradiction to faith, but an obvious prelude where religions drank from and grew. A place where songs are sung, melodies burst from any voice into lightness and singing words has an occult and powerful meaning. A place where past and future hold hands. -Isis

A collaboration between France’s Rajna and Italy’s Gor, Khvarena is unabashed in its worship of Dead Can Dance. The preponderance of Middle Eastern melodies, blend of traditional ethnic instruments with subtle synthesizers and Jeanne Lefebvre’s throaty vocals will make you look twice at The Spirit Rises’s credits. That said, DCD has been defunct for years, and Khvarena is nearly as good at the world music bop. “Nabah,” “Sultan” and the sultry snake dance “Hotar” are as enchanting as anything by the group’s idols, so arguing about hero worship is simply nitpicking. Exotic and lovely. -Michael Toland

La richezza del medioriente, saccheggiato e distrutto in parte per sempre dalle guerre per il petrolio, rivive grazie all'incontro tra Rajina e Gor, due meravigliose realtà nate tra le sponde del Mediterraneo che omaggiano le proprie origini offrendo rituali in forma di musiche senza tempo. E l'incontro lascia senza fiato: nulla dei pur bellissimi lavori prodotti finora sia dai Rajina che da Gor avrebbero potuto far mai immaginare cosa sarebbe nato da questo progetto. Il perenne tributo ai Dead Can Dance è solo un ricordo: “The Spirits Rises” è misticismo puro, una danza per dervishi che ballano sulla ruota del tempo. I suoni sono quelli degli strumenti persiani, iracheni ed egiziani: il timbro vellutato del nay suona melodie sinuose che sanno di deserto (“Zaraqustro”); l'oud echeggia saghe di eroi dimenticati e richezze sepolte sotto la sabbia dal tempo (“Khvarena”); “Zot” è il rito notturno in forma di preghiera che apre le porte del tempio. La sintonia tra Jeanne e Fabrice Lefebvre e Francesco Bianchini è totale: suonano come un gruppo rodato da anni e la speranza è che “The Spirits Rise” sia solo l'inizio di un lungo viaggio che non avrà mai fine. Per celebrare l'evento Sam Rsenthal ha stampato le prime mille copie dell'album dentro una confezione dvd digipak fatta con cartone reciclato color sabbia del deserto: non perdetela. Khvarena è il primo raggio di luce del 2007. -ROBERTO MANDOLINI

Recording artists Rajna (Jeanne and Facrive Lefebvre) and Gor (Francesco Banchini) have created a wonderfully complex and exotic album. Each song has a completely different sound and feel, yet all have more than a hint of Middle Eastern influence. The trio successfully weaves at times haunting, at times uplifting, always entrancing vocals with instruments ranging from dulcimer to zils to wind instruments. This is the perfect CD for anyone interested in belly dance, trance dance, yoga, or a mind journey to the Mediterranean.

I like to think of this work as a doorway to another world and another time - lost in the dust of ancient, buried cities in the Middle East. Francesco Bianchini (Ataraxia - Gor) and Jeanne & Fabrice Lefebvre (Rajna) write a mesmerizing blend of ethno-mediaeval ambient, and ritualistic, devotional music with their briefcase full of archaic instruments: tampura, crotal, santoor, singing bowls, and many others. What an ethereal voice Jeanne has. Rating: 90 out of 100. -Sergio Manghina

(an excerpt) Khvarena is a conception of musical beauty and vision, forged by Italian maestro Francesco Banchini of Gor and France's Jeanne & Fabrice Lefebvre of Rajna. A creation that does not hesitate in promising a whole new approach of blending the sounds and sanctity of medieval and ethnic music. Stating Dead can Dance as an influence, and in the same breath taking their composition to all new levels.