3'Ain

Worldwide Jazz with an Arabic twist

Yamen Martini (trompet), Otto Kint (contrabas) en Piet Maris (accordeon).

In 2015 Yamen moved from Syria to Belgium, where he met Piet: the two started working together on music for a theatre play in 2016.

Lateron, Piet invited Yamen to play and record as a guest musician with Jaune Toujours, as you can hear on their most recent album Europeana (2018).

Summer of 2019, they asked Otto to join in on their musical exchange, starting up a new trio.

The band name is based on ﻉ‎, which is the eighteenth letter of the Arabic alphabet, one of the most difficult vowels to pronounce for western people. As it is often indicated in Arabic chat- and SMS-conversation as 3, and in transliteration as 'ain, 3'Ain seemed an appropriate name for a trio playing contemporary jazz and world with influences from the Swana region (South West Asia and North Africa).

With their distinctive sound, they released their first EP on the Choux de Bruxelles label in May 2020, in full Covid lockdown. The subsequent full album, ‘Sea of Stories’ has been released in the Spring of 2023 and has received international acclaim in the press. Their music and song titles regularly refer to the surroundings and atmosphere of the place where they regularly work and create, in the port of Ostend, as does the single 'Scrambled Ensor'. 

They are releasing a new album - scheduled for release in May 2026 (exact date to be confirmed). The first single from the album is called ‘Oufti’ and was released on 27/3/26.