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Washington Report, April 2006, page 75 Waging Peace Oriental Music Ensemble Tours U.S.A.
THE premier U.S. Concert Tour of the Oriental Music Ensemble from Jerusalem got off to a grand start with two sold-out performances in Washington, DC. At the Feb. 15 event at Georgetown University’s Intercultural Center, Palestinian Ambassador Afif Safieh introduced the four gifted musicians: Suhail Khoury, composer, nay (flute), clarinet; Ibrahim Attari, qanun (zither); Ahmad Al-Khatib, oud (lute) composer, arranger; and Yousif Hbeisch, percussion. The following evening the four performed their own compositions and original arrangements of Arab folkloric music at the Smithsonian Institution’s Freer Gallery. The benefit concerts were sponsored by American Near East Refugee Aid (ANERA), and involved months of planning by the Tour Coordinator Kathy Habib as well as Freer Gallery expertise in navigating Homeland Security bureaucracy to obtain visas for the musicians. Khoury provided a brief introduction to each composition. For instance, he explained, Al Khatib wrote “Hikaya Sharqieh” (“Oriental Tale”) in April 2002, while Ramallah suffered through a 30-day curfew with little food or electricity. According to Khoury, Al Khatib tried to keep orchards and hills instead of Israeli tanks in his mind as he composed the piece. When he described the inspiration for one of his own songs, Khoury was matter of fact. While he was imprisoned for six months (for producing a musical tape Israelis didn’t like), Khoury said, he made a flute from a pipe and created “Atlit” (short for “From the Prison of Atlit to the Prison of Nakab”) to send a message of hope to his fellow Palestinian political prisoners. His first sad lingering notes on the clarinet cut deep into the heart of every listener. Other songs, some romantic, others patriotic, were composed by Egyptian, Moroccan, Tunisian, Lebanese, Iraqi, Kurdish and, of course, Palestinian musicians. While the audience had been asked to listen quietly because the Freer concert was being recorded, it was impossible to resist clapping along. The four Palestinian members of the ensemble are also faculty members of the Edward Said National Conservatory of Music, where both Arab and Western music is taught to 550 Palestinian students of elementary through high school age annually. Beginning in the late 1980s with a group of 40 students housed in Jerusalem’s YWCA, in 1993 the Conservatory became an affiliate of Birzeit University. Today, while still headquartered in Jerusalem, the Conservatory also has satellites in Ramallah and Bethlehem and holds workshops and community concerts in refugee camps and concert halls throughout the occupied territories as well as the rest of the world. Performing Arts Programmer for the Freer and Sackler said he was “blown away” when he heard about Palestinian kids studying violin and oud amid all the images of disorder he and other Americans see in the news. Rima Tarazi, who chairs the Conservatory board, observed that music has the power to enrich and create hope in beleaguered lands like Palestine. Music also teaches children to “reach for the stars “and “try to build a harmonious world,” Tarazi noted. For two memorable evenings the Oriental Music Ensemble brought Palestinian dreams and Arab culture to Washington, DC. For those who missed the concert and for others who want to remember it, the Oriental Music Ensemble has produced a CD, which is available from the AET Book Club. Much of the sale proceeds go to help Palestinian children study their rich heritage and escape the occupation of their land for a few hours at the Edward Said National Conservatory of Music. For more information on ANERA, visit <www.anera.org>. A podcast of the concert is also available on the Freer Gallery’s Web site: <http://www.asia.si.edu/podcasts/default.htm>. —Delinda C. Hanley |
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