Mystery. Contemplation. Alienation. Togetherness. Longing. Loneliness. A complex web of dream-like reflective moments shape the mood of With Closed Eyes, the video for the album of the same name created by Arash Behzadi, a globe-trotting entrepreneur — and exciting new talent in contemporary piano composition.
Press release by Karina Cortez
“I see the piano as an allegory for life,” Behzadi explains. “The piano mirrors existence in all its complexities from moments of profound sadness and loss to exhilaration and new beginnings.”
The imagery and music of the video, With Closed Eyes,
convey a dreamy sense of mysterious yearning. A young woman contemplatively strolls a windswept beach, wistfully gazing out over waves crashing onto a boulder-strewn shore. We see her from different perspectives — sharing her view of the endless horizon, then facing her and observing her from a distance. What is she thinking? Is she sad? Lonely? At peace? We then cut to Behzadi, casually seated and tapping out a melody on a boulder as the silver grey water slaps up against the rocks.
The next scene reveals the woman sensuously wrapped in a down duvet, stirring languorously in bed as a male figure in soft focus crosses a door frame in the background. Is he her lover? For a moment her eyes meet ours, as enigmatic as the Mona Lisa. Is she content? Indifferent?
The music flows gently, serenely, around the two people as they embrace, together, yet alone, Behzadi at the piano immersed in the music, the woman, lost in faraway thought, lovingly leaning against him as he plays, her eyes closed, once more meeting our gaze, before she returns to contemplate the endless horizon.
“The piano’s wide tonal range is both a physical and musical expression of the infinite range of emotions a person feels while exploring their own experience,” Behzadi explains.
Behzadi’s pieces on the album, With Closed Eyes, released in 2015, is a compelling collection of his own haunting piano compositions with titles such as “Solitude,” “Dilemma,” “Liberation,” “Journey of Life,” and “Existence.” all reflective of the gamut and flow of human emotions, the ups and downs of life, and its joys and the sorrows.
The about to be released video of the same name, directed and produced by Peyman Soheili in Florida interprets these emotions in a compelling yet mysterious visual narrative, all the more powerful in its spare simplicity.
Be sure to visit ArashBehzadi.com