

“Even with more than dozen of albums to date, Silvia Nakkach - a legendary singer and a Bay Area treasure - still surprised me with the depth and utter majesty that makes LIMINAL a truly ambient masterpiece! Ably aided by musician and producer Todd Boston, whose presence is everywhere evident, Silvia’s transcendent vision is supported by David Darling on cello, Jeff Oster on flugelhorn, and Val Serrant on percussion and voice. Skygazing...Take flight and land softly with Liminal.” – Lloyd Barde, Music Editor, Common Ground Magazine
“Space... the final frontier.” For anyone who has ever watched Star Trek, these iconic words will strike a resonant chord. Although these words could also describe LIMINAL, the new album by GRAMMY nominated composer, vocalist, and instrumentalist Silvia Nakkach whose music is as much about sound as it is about the space that surrounds it. Billowing clouds of ambient atmospheres carry elements of Indian ragas, sacred Afro-Brazilian chants, and more that drift serenely over ever-evolving sonic terrain that is expansive, ethereal, and enchanting.” – Michael Diamond, Music and Media Focus
“ Silvia has chosen some excellent players to express her feelings and artistic creativity regarding clouds (and the beauty of them). The album is produced by Todd Boston, and her vocals on all the tunes are easy to become enrapture with. In “Liminal Moon”, Silvia’s whispered/haunting vocals give you just what she was reaching for when she created this beautiful musical adventure – a barely perceptible influencing of your being that will thrill you for many years to come! I give Silvia and her cohorts a MOST HIGHLY RECOMMENDED for this excellent and inspiring music. “
– Rotcod Zzaj, IMPROVIJAZZATION NATION magazine

Advance Praise for LIMINAL
Produced by Todd Boston, engineer, musician & multi-instrumentalist
“I approach LIMINAL music as a gentle journey through fluid sound landscapes and ephemeral voices moving, transforming and dissolving like clouds in the sky.
It invites a more open listening experience where time is dilated. Listening becomes a place where one can go when needing more space. “ Silvia Nakkach
“I am blessed! Sometimes I am invited to add my horn to music that is extraordinary, transcendent. LIMINAL. It’s so beautiful...I highly recommend that you add it to your HEART. In a very busy world, this music is an oasis.” – Jeff Oster, trumpet/flugelhorn artist.
“An atmospheric masterpiece. The gauze-like layering of ambiance breathes in radial, reflective waves, almost perceptually undiffer- entiated yet ever-changing. The subtle tonalities interweave with such sublime grace and fluidity, at once a tapestry of nuance and delicate grandeur. Sound texture and design including cello, voice, trumpet, guitar and piano thread seamlessly a mosaic of continuity. Each refined and restrained musical element dip and rise like a slow, elegant waltz. The compositions, as in nature, inhale and exhale, with both intricacy and profound simplicity. An immersion in a liminal space.” – Ron Tofanelli, DJ. Sound Spaces Founder-Director
“The evolution of music will be impossible without composers and musicians like Silvia Nakkach, multi-talented time-traveler, melody driven, harmonious soundscaper. Her sensitive knowl- edge of the higher senses translates tone and texture into LIMINAL. In this refined piece of art, lush contemporary harmo- nies and creative melodies echoes on the ancient teachings of the East and the West. Crystal clear production by Todd Boston, and flawless performances makes the experience complete. Silvia’s ground-breaking work LIMINAL opens a whole new category in music to enhance our own evolution as listeners. I welcome the return to creativity, with visionary works like this the future of higher music is safe. Highly recommended!” – Jorge Alfano, musician, producer, and clinical hypnotherapist. Founder Sacred Sounds institute.
Read LIMINAL full description on CD liner notes www.silvianakkach.com / snakkach@cs.com Download LIMINAL digital audio: http://bit.ly/1J0MXIe
The Making of Liminal




Photo : courtesy of David Darling









Photography by Andrea Boston Visuals
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As Clouds Disperse
The Sounding Board
R J Lannan
Liminal. I have heard the word before. In means right on the edge of perception. Like the corner of your eye or the back of your mind. It is right there, only it is not. Silvia Nakkach’s album, Liminal is tangible on many levels, including the one we sometimes really do not understand. The nine tracks of atmospheric music combined with gentle singing features her wordless vocalese with Middle Eastern flavorings. It is cloud’s music. Read that again. It has a soft texture and a subtle energy. It is drifting and dreamlike.
The music is further enhanced by the talents of trumpeter Jeff Oster, violoncello magician David Darling and vocalist Val Serrant. Todd Boston not only did a superlative job on engineering the project, but adds piano and guitar to the mix and he is a co-composer as well. The arrangements are flawlessly flowing, sometimes pastoral, sometimes pensive with great ebb and flow. I liked every track. It was an odd sensation to listen to the music. After every track was complete, only then did I seem to draw a breath.
The first cut, Liminal Clouds opens like a dreamy sound track. It is the precursor to the whole album that demonstrates Nakkach’s ability to equalize music and voice. I looked up to see cerulean skies and powder puff clouds dancing together in the heavens and the music was perfect. Liminal Beauty is eponymous as a title. There is a soft nuance to the music, as if this particular world is painted in pastel colors. The melody is dreamlike, often surreal. Silvia has scrubbed away all the ugliness and left this as a gift for our senses.
The somewhat discordant sound of the violoncello opens the song Liminal Motion. Once we gain momentum, things smooth out and we are urged by the music to go forward, ever forward. Silvia’s delicate vocal dips in like a dragonfly, never really touching down, but always there. The tempo increases and we cannot help but follow. There is a great deal of subtext, musically speaking, to the tune Liminal Light. We are illuminated by the muted light of the dawn sun, the twinkling stars of the night sky and the sometimes brilliant light from within. The music fades from one to the other offering the listener a chance to pick a source.
The tune Liminal Dream was a favorite with a more pronounced vocal layer that soothes the spirit like a balm. The music weaves in and out of reality, offering glimpses of our fantasies, but leaving the definition up to us. There is a lightness to this song and we drift about ignoring compass points as if they do not exist. The focus of the final cut, Liminal Moon is Oster’s glorious trumpet. The sound weaves in and out of the melody like the light from the moon beaming through eddying clouds. The light turns from silver to blue and evaporates. We can almost feel the moon revolving, and when the light returns, we ae enveloped in moon shadows.
Silvia Nakkach’s music is usual for its intrinsic equilibrium, no instrument or voice overpowering the next, always harmonious, always in balance. Although the music was very light, I could almost feel the weight of sensation pressing on me like water in the ocean. This is an album that you can put on and get contentedly lost in. Just keep your eye on the clouds.

Grammy® nominated composer Silvia Nakkach has been an exhilarating and unique bridge between American and South Asian musical traditions for more than 30 years. From a background in North Indian classical music and avant-garde composition, Nakkach has evolved her own style employing elements of minimal melodicism, electronic liminal sonorities, and orbital rhythmic materials that seeks to transcends the ordinary sense of time, and exploring the relation between music and space. Her entrancing art-music draws elements from ambient and contemporary new music on one hand, and classical Indian ragas and sacred Afro-Brazilian chants on the other. Creating a language of its own, each of her dozens of released albums is a gentle rendition of her passionate and studious dedication to unusual vocal-cultures and extended sound atmospheres, a vital new repertoire perfectly attuned for global listeners. Beyond categories, Nakkach has cultivated a voice that transports the listeners into the heart of devotion and her voice-work covers an enormous amount of territory. Named by Utne Reader magazine as "One of the 40 cutting-edge artists that will shake the art world in the new millennium", she is an internationally renowned vocal artist, a recording producer, as well as a sought after educator and author. She is on the faculty of the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS) where she created the premier certificate program on Sound, Voice and Music in the Healing Arts offered by a major academic institution. In addition, she has lectured widely in many prestigious universities across Europe, South America, and at the New York University (NYU), and Arizona State University (ASU) among others in the US.

Todd Boston's music has gained popularity and recognition worldwide. His albums have received numerous nominations and awards and have been featured on radio stations internationally. His album Touched by the Sun produced with Grammy winner Will Ackerman (Windham Hill Records) was chosen Best Acoustic Instrumental Album of the Year at the 2012 ZMR Music Awards and charted #1 on the World/New Age listening charts. In 2013 Todd collaborated on Peter Kater’s Grammy Nominated album Illumination and on Wouter Kellerman's 2015 Grammy Nominated album Love's Language. Todd Spent 2012-2013 touring with singer Snatam Kaur and Ramesh Kannan as touring bandmates. His song Twilight is featured on a Putumayo World Music compilation titled Acoustic Yoga released September 2016.
Todd is a producer of World, Folk, Ambient, New Age, Contemporary Instrumental, Meditation, Indie, Rock & Pop styles. He has worked and performed with greats such as, Will Ackerman (Windham Hill), Alex Degrassi, Barbara Higbie, Michael Manring, Snatam Kaur, Ramesh Kannan, Tony Levin (legendary bassist of Peter Gabriel), Charlie Bisharat (Grammy Winning Violinist), Jeff Haynes (Grammy Winning Percussionist), Eugene Friesen (Grammy Winning Cellist), Shambhu, Jeff Oster, Tom Eaton, Deva Premal & Mitten, Manose, Tina Malia, Shimshai, Donna De Lory & more. He has performed at prominent festivals such as Wanderlust Festival, Earthdance, Harmony, the Mac Conference and at events globally.
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