Shahin & Sepehr

Long before forming their new age duo, Shahin Shahida and Sepehr Haddad had already established a friendship. Both musicians of Iranian descent—Shahida on guitar and Haddad on keyboards—first connected as students at Iran's International School of Tehran. An age gap separated them, with Shahida in seventh grade while Haddad was a tenth grader, yet music bridged that divide. At weekly student gatherings they delivered covers of "Stairway to Heaven" and other hits of the era, all without formal classical training.

Although they share Iranian heritage and their playing styles mesh well, the pair came from different backgrounds. Haddad was born in Washington, D.C., while Shahida was born in Iran and attended elementary school in Austria. After leaving the Tehran school in 1975, Haddad moved to California and studied agriculture at U.C. Davis, spending evenings performing Cat Stevens and Jethro Tull material in local coffeehouses. Following graduation he returned to Washington and resumed musical work with Shahida.

Shahida arrived in the United States two years later, enrolling at American University in Washington, D.C., where he majored in finance. Drawing inspiration from Santana and Eric Clapton, he performed with several rock bands, including four years with Amsterdam before joining Feast or Famine; during the Amsterdam period the group opened for Angela Bofill and Spyro Gyra. The music of Shahin & Sepehr was later used by the Barbara Bush Literacy Campaign, and Brazilian soccer players adopted it for training sessions. The duo recorded a demo that received frequent airplay on Washington station WLLT.