Rashed

I was fascinated by art and music when I was young, especially Kurdish art and music. In Class 6, in primary school, my teachers found out that I had a very good voice and talent. They told me I had very good artistic ability.

I loved the saz instrument because it is part of the Kurdish culture, and I have tried to play it all the time, to just build my ability and get better at it.

Because my financial situation was not good, I couldn’t take art and music as my only work. I found it necessary to sing and play music as a hobby, and take other work just to be able to live. But I was always thinking of playing music and singing in my spare time and trying to improve my skill.

At the beginning of 1990, my teacher Mr Welid tried to help me to learn the flute for my school activities, and we managed to make a band from Duhok that played at festivals and parties throughout the country. We went to Baghdad, Hewler, Sulaimanya and Musol representing Duhok with the band, and because there was only one Kurdish TV station in the country at that time, our concerts were shown all the time.

After a while with the band, I found out that I had some acting ability as well. I was working with the director Azad Abdullah in the theatre and he tried hard to help me a lot.

I then participated in a play called Jiyan, which we performed for some famous Iraqi actors and artists, such as Khalil Al Rifa’ai, Fozeya Al Shindi and Taha Salem.

About my art activities in Europe... I believe that our culture and the European culture are quite different. That’s why I found it very difficult for us to understand each other in terms of culture. I have many activities in the UK, and we played many gigs for the Kurdish people all around the country, for Newroz and the Kurdish Day and New Year events. Also we played in many cities, such as London, Glasgow, Manchester, Hull, Cardiff and Barnsley, and we managed to show our culture there to both Kurds and non-Kurds. Also we showed our culture to students in school and to befriend them.

We were interviewed by the BBC Look North programme and BBC Radio about Kurdish culture and there we managed to show our music to the English people as well, because we found it essential to make links with other cultures and work together to create something unique and special. We played some free gigs, and the reason for this was to show our style of music.

Writing the music for The Legend of Kawa the Blacksmith, I found myself very lucky to be working with Splash Animations, and especially for the first time to be writing the music for a film.

I believe writing film music is very different from writing a song, and I  never thought that I would one day write the music for a company making an animated film. It is true that I have been working with music for a very long time, but we had many difficulties finishing this music, and many times our music was refused by the directors of the film, but they gave us a chance to rewrite it.

It was very important for me to get the role of Kawa the Blacksmith, and that happened by accident. When we wrote the music for Splash Animations, I was asked by the directors if I knew anyone with the ability to play this role. I took an audition and tested myself, read some lines for them, and they were very happy and I got the role of Kawa the  Blacksmith.

I think the role of Kawa the Blacksmith wasn’t an easy role because the person who plays this role should show all of his artistic abilities. This project is different from acting in the theatre because it doesn’t require the actors to be shown and to play in front of the people. It just requires a very good voice.

It is a great step forward and a very good idea for a Kurdish project like this to be done in Britain, and to show Kurdish culture in both Kurdish and English to the rest of the world. I believe The Legend of Kawa the Blacksmith will make very good and important communication between the Kurds and the rest of the world nations.