Rock Paper Scissors - Arabesque Music Ensemble, The Music of the Three Musketeers (Xauen Music)

It's called "The Music of the Three Musketeers," but it's not of those musketeers.

Instead, when the Arabesque Music Ensemble plays Wednesday evening at the Chicago Cultural Center, it will perform work by three historic Arabic composers.

Their names are not known to the general public. But the music of Zakariyya Ahmad, Muhammad al-Qasabji and Riyad al-Sunbati long has been sung in Arabic culture.

What does this music sound like? With its incantatory vocals and lush instrumentals, this music doesn't rush to climaxes or unfold to a rhythmic pulse. Instead, its sinuous melodies unfold unhurriedly, using exotic scales and "bent note" pitches unfamiliar to most Western ears.

This work has been collected on a revelatory new CD, "The Music of the Three Musketeers," eloquently performed by the Arabesque Music Ensemble.

But it's the live performance that should give this music its best showcase, particularly because the Arabesque Music Ensemble will be playing a room that could be ideal--the reverberant Preston Bradley Hall in the Chicago Cultural Center.

The Arabesque Ensemble performs at 7:30 p.m.

Wednesday at the Chicago Cultural Center, 78 E. Washington St.; free; 312-744-6630.

-- by Howard Reich