Mission

The Afghan Music Project (AMP) is a social venture with the goal of raising the awareness of the beauty of traditional Afghan music and the tragic, but uplifting, story of Afghan women through a professionally recorded album. Proceeds from the AMP album will go towards funding educational scholarships for Afghan women.

Background

Over the course of the last three decades, the country of Afghanistan has been decimated by war and genocide. From the brutal invasion of the Soviet Union in the late 1970s to the senseless and destructive civil war throughout the early 1990s to the oppressive and murderous reign of the Taliban in the late 1990s, Afghanistan has been hell on earth. During these horrific times, the people of Afghanistan turned to music for solace to remember a more peaceful time. Music became an outlet for the emotional stress of being subjected to such awful conditions. While under Taliban rule, women were treated as property with no human rights, subjugated to an existence of imposed silence and dark shadows. Participation in something as ‘sinful’ as public singing resulted in severe punishment, sometimes death.

Media and Afghan Women

The American and European public has been engrossed by the plight of the Afghan women. Upon the fall of the Taliban, the sight of the oppressive burkas taken off the faces of Afghan women for the first time resonated everywhere. The horror of their existence was profiled in every media source across the globe. With the fall of the Taliban, and the democratic, inclusive government of President Hamad Karzai, Afghanistan, and specifically Afghan women, have a future to tell, an uplifting story for all who have followed.

The story of the Afghan women still creates strong emotions in the hearts and minds of the American public. With the recent success of the motion picture, Osama, the two New York Times best sellers, The Kite Runner and The Bookseller of Kabul, the revenue-generating value of the Afghan story is high. From First Lady Laura Bush to Jay Leno’s wife, the list of high-profile people taking on the cause of the Afghan women is a potential source of important free publicity for the album. There is a demand for this story, this culture, especially if some of the proceeds go back to the women. Furthermore, the music is a beautiful music, with Persian strings and Arabesque beats, featuring haunting, delicate, and inspirational voices. In summation all these facts make the case for this album becoming the next Buena Vista Social Club, Afghan style.

Proposal

AMP will first record professional tracks in Kabul, Afghanistan, working with seasoned professionals. The album will focus on the “Women Voices of Afghanistan.” Ultimately, AMP will become a compilation album featuring a mix of popular artists and music with traditional Afghan folk music, creating a unique music product that will appeal to a large and diverse customer base.

Phase 1: Team AMP will travel to Kabul and enlist local, professional talent to create a diverse collection of classical Afghan folk tracks with different female vocalists headlining each track. Along with the digital music recordings, Team AMP will digitally film this amazing experience. AMP will master the recordings and edit the film at the University of California studios in Berkeley. The initial goal of Phase 1 will be at least one digital recording that can be released at any digital music store. The second goal of Phase 1 will be a digital short film that serves as a marketing piece for Phase 2.

Phase 2: With the digital short film and at least one digital music track, Team AMP will approach both music artists and labels to participate in a compilation album that brings together the sounds of socially conscious artists (from Madonna to Bono to Carlos Santana) and the heart-wrenching sounds of Afghan female vocalists. Popular artists will record vocals and/or background tracks that will be mixed with the Afghan folk music, creating a unique and exciting compilation that will appeal to a large and diverse customer base. AMP is confident its digital short film marketing strategy will gain Team AMP the music management audience necessary to help them achieve their goals.