Wanees Zarour

Wanees Zarour: Silwan

by Jack Bowers
December 17, 2025

There are times when not knowing what to expect can be helpful. Wanees Zarour, a Palestinian American artist who now calls Chicago home, plays the buzuq and oud, stringed instruments from the Middle East, and couples them on Silwan with his skills as a composer to produce melodic and colorful images of his homeland interspersed with contemporary jazz. As Zarour observes on the inner jacket, “This album is about places, built with stones older than the stories written to erase ...