classes
Objective image Amir Vahab image Events image Museum image Shabahang image Gallery image Audio image Video image Classes image Store image Press image Contact image Guestbook image Links image

Home >> Classes

All classes are located in the historic and convenient "Museum Mile" of the Upper East Side.
Online Skype lessons are also offered on all classes listed below.
All you need are a PayPal and a Zoom or Skype account!! For more info contact: amirvahab@gmail.com

 
 
Novice
Intermediate
Advanced
Professional
 
• 
• 
Kamanche
 
 •
• 
 
 •
 
 •
 

Persian / Farsi Language by native speaker(read, write and speak)
Persian Poetry Rumi & Hafez (Translation and Interpretation)
WEEKLY Persian Poetry Workshop: https://amirvahab.com/workshop.php
Persian Poetry Recitation (The art of recitation)
Persian Calligraphy

Sufism

Turkish Language by native speaker(read, write and speak)
French Language (read, write and speak)
English Language (read, write and speak)

Music lessons (children)
Drum Circle (Adults)
Drum Circle (Children)
Persian Folk Dance (Adults)
Persian Folk Dance (Children)
Line Dances
Middle Eastern Dances
Yoga
Pilates
Zoor-khaneh (Ancient Persian martial arts / Persian Yoga a.k.a. Dance of Strength)
Backgammon (Ancient Persian Game)
Watch Making & Repair
Clock Making & Repair


Persian / Farsi Language Classes

"You live a new life for every new language you speak. If you know only one language, you will live only once."
Are you interested in learning Persian?
If you are planning on visiting Iran for business or vacation and if you would like to learn more about the Persian culture to blend in with local people, this is for you.
Learn with native Persian speaking polyglot, how to improve your Persian conversational skills and to read in Persian. Special method to build your vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation, conversation and translation.
We can work peer to peer on oral communication and grammar. Amir Vahab with a degree in linguistics from Univesity of Paris and more than three decades of experience in teaching languages. Private and group lessons for all levels with flexible schedule.

If there is a specific reason you need to learn the language, we can structure the time in anyway you need. Learn proper cadence and vocabulary, improve comprehension, learn about Iran through music, movies, poetry. It is fun!!! Sensitive to the needs of foreign language learners.

Classical Persian / Farsi Language

Classical Persian Language (with idiomatic expressions & poetic sophistication).
If you can handle the every day conversation, but you would like to be able to comprehend and use a more sophisticated classical Persian language, using expressions, idioms and poetry?
"Now you can study the Classical Persian"
Learn also about the Persian Culture, History, Poetry, Mysticism and Sufism. Also You can have one on one classes to focus exactly on your needs and the area of your interest, or if you know others who have similar interest and you would like to study as a small group.


Drumming Classes

"Music brings people together. It allows us to experience the same emotions.
People everywhere are the same in heart and spirit."

Facilitated Group Drumming Programs for Corporate Events * Teambuilding * Wellness * Celebrations * Hands-On Entertainment * Community

Drumming is health food for your mind, body and spirit. For centuries drumming has been used as a social activity for creating a sense of community, resolving tension (both within and without), and celebrating life. In the same transportive ways as reading a good book or a runners high, a drumming circle can transport you out of your day-to-day stress and worries into a state of being "both energized and relaxed." It is easy for anyone to participate at any level, since no one in a drum circle is more or less important than anyone else. Absolutely no experience is required. Any and all percussion instruments welcome. (Some instruments are provided.)

"The drummings are prayers."
When we drum we pray to the Creator and attract the heartbeat of the earth. We never drum without reason; every drumming has a purpose. We drum for healing; we drum for seasons; we drum for joy; we drum for our children; we drum for the people; we drum for courage. The drum plays to the beat of the heart, to the beat of the Earth. The drumming connects us to the Earth while we drum our prayers. So let us all drum.
Oh, Great One, let my drum and prayer be heard by You.

***

Learn how to Play the Frame Drum:

The basic strokes for playing the frame drum are presented in conjunction with mnemonic devices and physical motion to nurture a conscious awareness and understanding of the rhythm and pulse all humans possess. Through drumming, humans are able to cultivate a clearer understanding of the rhythm that exists around and within us at all times. Through nurturing our personal awareness of rhythm, we may be better able to understand and respond to the nature of the world in which we live. No previous musical experience is required. In the ancient Mediterranean world, frame drumming was an omnipresent tool of ritual. Frame drummers are seen in Greek vase paintings, Egyptian wall paintings, Mesopotamian figurines and relief, and Roman sarcophagi. Amir has drawn upon the abundant pictorial representations of those drumming ancestors (some as old as 5000 years, such as those played in the Zoroastrian Temples), to create a bond between their ritualistic sound making and his modern drumming creations.


Persian & Turkish Line Dancing Workshop:

Kurdish, Armenian, Greek and Assyrian line dances. Guaranteed to have fun! Meetup with other local people who love Near Eastern Line Dancing! Gather to show your best moves and learn some new ones! Line Dance Workshop is the ever growing true blast and the most entertaining cardio session in town. Do not get intimidated if you are a novice or do not think you know all of them! "Dancing in a group where everyone coordinates and adjusts to other people's speeds and styles is different than dancing alone; it's very empowering to feel a part of a grander movement. And when we all do align ourselves, it's an incredible feeling!"


Zoor-khaneh (Ancient Persian martial arts / Persian Yoga a.k.a. Dance of Strength)

Coming soon!


Music lessons help young child memories:

Private and group classes as well as workshops are available for children.


For more information regarding:

Concerts
Lectures
Workshops
Private & Group Lessons
Persian Musical Instruments ( buy, sell and repair)

Please contact Amir Vahab at: 646 964 7764 or email him at: amirvahab@gmail.com



     

Music Related Articles:

BBC NEWS
Music training 'good for heart'
Learning a musical instrument could be good for the heart, a study suggests.
Learning an instrument could boost relaxation abilities.
Italian and British researchers compared the effect of a range of pieces, from Beethoven to techno, on musicians and non-musicians.
Tempo, rather than style, was found to be the greatest stress-buster in both groups, the study in Heart found.
But the effects were stronger for the musicians among the 24 people studied, as they had been trained to synchronise breathing with musical phrases.
Scientists from the University of Pavia and the University of Oxford studied breathing and circulation in 24 young men and women, before and while they listened to short excerpts of music.
Half were highly-trained musicians, who had been playing instruments such as the violin, piano, flute, clarinet or bass for at least seven years. The remainder had had no musical training.
Each participant listened to short tracks of different types of music in random order, for two minutes, followed by the same selection of tracks for four minutes each.
A two-minute pause was randomly inserted into each of these sequences.
Relaxation techniques
Participants listened to raga (Indian classical music), Beethoven's ninth symphony (slow classical), rap (the Red Hot Chili Peppers), Vivaldi (fast classical), techno, and Anton Webern (slow '12 tone music').
Faster music, and more complex rhythms, speeded up breathing and circulation, irrespective of style, with fast classical and techno music having the same impact.
Slower or more meditative music had the opposite effect, with raga music creating the largest fall in heart rate.
Indications of relaxation were particularly evident during the pauses between tracks.
The effects were most evident in those with musical training.
The researchers suggest the effects of slow rhythms and pauses could be helpful in preventing or treating heart disease and stroke.
Writing in Heart, the team, led by Dr Luciano Bernadi and Professor Peter Sleight, said: "Appropriate selection of music, by alternating fast and slower rhythms and pauses, can be used to induce relaxation, and so can be potentially be useful for cardiovascular disease."
Dr Charmaine Griffiths, spokesperson at the British Heart Foundation (BHF), said: "This small study adds to the work BHF scientists are doing to understand how positive emotional state and relaxation can contribute to our wellbeing.
"BHF researchers have already shown associations between emotions and signs of good heart health.
"People relax in different ways and it may be that music is key for some while for others curling up with a good book or taking a long walk is just as beneficial.
"One person's Mozart may be someone else's Madonna and it may be that different people find relaxation in different types of music."
Other research has shown that music can cut stress, improve athletic performance, improve movement in neurologically impaired patients, and even boost milk production in cattle.
THE TUNES IN THE STUDY
Raga (slow) - Debabrata Chaudhuri: introduction from 'Raga Maru Behag'
Classical (slow) - Ludwig van Beethoven: 'Adagio molto e cantabile' from Symphony no 9
12 tone music (slow) - Anton Webern: 'Zart bewegt' from 'Pieces for orchestra'
Rap - Red Hot Chili Peppers: 'The power of equality' from 'Blood Sugar Sex Magic'
Techno - Gigi D'agostino: 'You Spin Me Round' from 'Techno Fes vol 2'
Classical (fast) - Antonio Vivaldi: 'Presto' from 'Estate', concerto for violin, orchestra and continuo
One person's Mozart may be someone else's Madonna and it may be that different people find relaxation in different types of music
Dr Charmaine Griffiths, British Heart Foundation



***

 

YAHOO NEWS
Playing Music Makes You Smart
Charles Q. Choi
Special to LiveScience
LiveScience.com Mon Mar 19, 9:35 AM ET
Scientists have uncovered the first concrete evidence that playing music can significantly enhance the brain and sharpen hearing for all kinds of sounds, including speech.
"Experience with music appears to help with many other things in life, potentially transferring to activities like reading or picking up nuances in tones of voices or hearing sounds in a noisy classroom better," researcher Nina Kraus, a neuroscientist at Northwestern University, told LiveScience.
These new findings highlight the importance of music classes, she said.
"Music classes are often among the first to be cut when school budgets get tight," Kraus said. "That's a mistake."
"Music classes are often among the first to be cut when school budgets get tight," Kraus said. "That's a mistake."
Experiments started with 20 adult volunteers, who watched and listened to a movie of their choice. "'Men in Black,' 'The Incredibles,' 'Best in Show' were favorites," Kraus said.
As they watched movies, the volunteers also listened to Mandarin words that sounded like "mi" continuously at conversation level in the background. Mandarin is a tone language, where a single word can differ in meaning depending on its tone. For example, the Mandarin word "mi" means "to squint" when delivered in a level tone, "to bewilder" when spoken in a rising tone, and "rice" when given in a falling then rising tone.
The researchers recorded neural responses from the brains of volunteers during the experiments. Half the volunteers had at least six years of training in a musical instrument starting before the age of 12. The others had no more than three years of musical experience. All were native English speakers who had no knowledge of Mandarin.
"Even with their attention focused on the movie and though the sounds had no linguistic or musical meaning for them, we found our musically trained subjects were far better at tracking the three different tones than the non-musicians," said neuroscientist Patrick Wong at Northwestern University.
Wong emphasized these results were seen "in more or less everyday people. You don't have to be a top musician to find these kinds of effects."
Surprisingly, the researchers found these changes occurred in the brainstem, the ancient part of the brain responsible for controlling automatic, critical body functions such as breathing and heartbeat.
Music was thought largely to be the province of the cerebral cortex, where higher brain functions such as reasoning, thought and language are seated. The brainstem was thought to be unchangeable and uninvolved in the complex processes linked with music.
"These results show us how malleable to experience the brainstem actually is," Kraus said of the findings detailed in the April issue of the journal Nature Neuroscience. "We think music engages higher level functions in the cortex that actually tune the brainstem."
Much remains open for investigation. "How much musical training would you need for this to be helpful?" Kraus wondered. "Would music help children with literacy problems? How old would you have to be to see these effects?"

***

 

BEATS USED TO PROMOTE HEALTH
Science & Health
Wednesday, April 18, 2007
Experts say that those who actively participate in drum circles can experience stress release, improved motor skills and open areas of communication.
By Jennifer Lynch and Laura Newcomer
FOR THE COLLEGIAN
Although Art and drawing are typically associated with self-expression, experts say that drum circles – a lesser-known musical tradition – can help people express themselves while improving their physical and mental health in the process.
Carol Lindsay, a professional drummer and drum circle facilitator, describes drum circles as an interactive experience of self-expression.
Participants sit in a circle and learn how to express themselves by playing different percussion instruments. This technique is known as the principle of entrainment – the law of synchronization when two rhythms naturally line up.
Some of the benefits of participating in rhythmic drumming can include stress release, improved motor skills and open communication, Lindsay said.
Lindsay recently created the State College-based drumming program Rhythm Play with friend and fellow drum circle enthusiast Jenny Conway to share her passion with others.
Group drumming specifically boosts the immune system through an increase in natural-killer activity – white blood cells that seek out and destroy cancer cells, said Alyssa Janney, manager of the Health Rhythms department at Remo Inc. drumming company.
The company recently developed this department to further study the benefits of rhythm drumming on the immune system and body functions.
Health Rhythms has conducted multiple studies to explore the physiological and social benefits of drum circles.
Their findings show that drum circles have the potential to alter stress-related hormones, improving mood states and acting as a social tool for building camaraderie and support, Janney said.
Lindsay has worked with all types of clients, from school children to Alzheimer’s patients at the Brookline Village healthcare and retirement community.
“It’s for everyone,” Lindsay said. “The great thing [about drum circles] is that no prior experience is necessary.”
Lindsay uses other forms of percussion, from driftwood to bells, to reduce the pressure of the situation and create a non-intimidating atmosphere for clients, she said.
Lindsay said in a very verbally oriented society, drumming is a therapy that offers a form of expression without words to help sharpen other skills.
For example, autistic individuals are able to express themselves through rhythmic communications, while Alzheimer’s patients’ focus on hand clapping and singing songs to help trigger and retain certain memories, she said.
Music taps into parts of the brain that are not involved in verbal communication and can therefore provide other ways of connecting and communicating, said Valerie Stratton, music therapy expert and associate professor of psychology at Penn State Altoona.
She said rhythm drumming is especially helpful for people who may experience trouble communicating verbally.
People are attracted to drum circles for individual reasons, but there “clearly are physical and mental health benefits to drumming,” said Dan Trevino, senior lecturer in biobehavioral health and a drum circles leader at Penn State. The circle is a chance to leave work and worries behind, he said.
The common denominator among participants seems to be “a desire to relax and do something that’s fun, to be with other people and create something together – a musical rhythm that sounds good,” Trevino said.

***

 

Objective | Amir Vahab | Events | ShabAhang | Gallery | Audio | Video | Classes | Store | Press | Contact | Links
SUFI MUSIC, SUFI MUSIC IN NEW YORK, SUFI MUSICIANS, Zarb classes, Zarb lessons, Zarb teaching, Zarb instruction NY / New York, Daf classes, Daf lessons, Daf teaching, Daf instruction NY / New York, Frame drum teaching, frame drum classes, frame drum lessons, frame drum instruction, Farsi practicing, Tanbur classes, Tanbur lessons, Tanbur teaching, Tanbur instruction NY / New York, Tanbour classes, Tanbour lessons, Tanbour teaching, Tanbour instruction NY / New York, Tanboor classes, Tanboor lessons, Tanboor teaching, Tanboor instruction NY / New York, Tamboor classes, Tamboor lessons, Tamboor teaching, Tamboor instruction NY / New York, Tar classes, Tar lessons, Tar teaching, Tar instruction NY / New York, Setar classes, Setar lessons, Setar teaching, Setar instruction NY / New York, Kamancheh classes, Kamancheh lessons, Kamancheh teaching, Kamancheh instruction NY / New York, Ney classes, Ney lessons, Ney teaching, Ney instruction NY / New York, Nay classes, Nay lessons, Nay teaching, Nay instruction NY / New York, Dohol classes, Dohol lessons, Dohol teaching, Dohol instruction NY / New York, Persian courses, Persian classes, Persian lessons, Persian teaching, Persian instruction NY / New York, Farsi courses, Farsi classes, Farsi lessons, Farsi teaching, Farsi instruction NY / New York, Kurdish Dance classes, Kurdish Dance lessons, Kurdish Dance teaching, Kurdish Dance instruction NY / New York, Drumming workshop, Drum Workshop, Drumming Circle, Drumcircle, Drum Circle, Drum jam NY / New York, folk dance workshop NY/New York, Dohol classes, Dohol lessons, Dohol teaching, Dohol instruction NY / New York, Davul classes, Davul lessons, Davul teaching, Davul instruction NY / New York, Santoor classes, Santoor lessons, Santoor teaching, Santoor instruction NY / New York, Santur classes, Santur lessons, Santur teaching, Santur instruction NY / New York, Tombak classes, Tombak lessons, Tombak teaching, Tombak instruction NY / New York, Tonbak classes, Tonbak lessons, Tonbak teaching, Tonbak instruction NY / New York, Doumbek classes, Doumbek lessons, Doumbek teaching, Doumbek instruction NY / New York, Voice classes, Voice lessons, Voice teaching, Voice instruction, Voice training NY / New York, Saz classes, Saz lessons, Saz teaching, Saz instruction NY / New York, Baglama classes, Baglama lessons, Baglama teaching, Baglama instruction NY / New York, Darbuka Darbouka classes, Darbuka Darbouka lessons, Darbuka Darbouka teaching, Darbuka Darbouka instruction NY / New York, Persian singing classes, Persian singing lessons, Persian singing teaching, Persian singing instruction NY / New York, Persian dance classes, Persian dance lessons, Persian dance teaching, Persian dance instruction NY / New York, Drumming Circles in Manhattan, Drum Circle in Manhattan, Buzuq classes, buzuq lessons, Buzuq teaching, buzuq instruction, davul classes, davul lessons, davul teaching, davul instruction, Frame drumming, Hand drumming, Hand Drummers, Frame drummers, Drum Circle facilitator, Drum Circle facilitators, Drum Circles Facilitation, Facilitating Drum Circles, Tar repair, Setar repair, Tanbur repair, Tanbour repair, tanboor repair, middle eastern musical instruments repaired, bought and sold.