Syria - remember the musicians


With political unrest continuing in Syria we should remember the musicians there, some of who have featured on the path. My header image shows the Syrian brothers Khaled Al Jaramani and Mohannad Al Jaramani together with French clarinetist Raphaël Vuillard: their CD of Sufi inspired improvisations Bab Assalam, which featured here last year, was recorded in the ancient city of Aleppo in northern Syria which has been the centre of some of the recent disturbances. Composer and singer Abed Azrié was born in Syria and he recorded his humanist The Gospel of John with traditional musicans, soloists and choir from Damascus as well as young musicians from France. This recording, which deserves to reach a wide audience, was supported by the Syrian Ministry of Culture and when I wrote about it eight months ago I added a health warning about Syria's human rights record. Orthodox Islam considers Sufism to be heretical, but Syria has a long tradition of Sufi brotherhoods. The Syrian muqri (Koran reader) and munshid (hymnodist) Hamza Shakkur and the Ensemble Al-Kindi were featured in my Sufi Soul article and they perform in the accompanying podcast which can be heard here.

Also on Facebook and Twitter. Any copyrighted material on these pages is included as "fair use", for the purpose of study, review or critical analysis only, and will be removed at the request of copyright owner(s). Report broken links, missing images and errors to - overgrownpath at hotmail dot co dot uk

Comments

Recent popular posts

Why new audiences are deaf to classical music

For young classical audiences the sound is the message

The Berlin Philharmonic's darkest hour

Who am I?

Audiences need permission to like unfamiliar music

Classical music's biggest problem is that no one cares

Nada Brahma - Sound is God

Classical music's $11 billion market opportunity

Jerry Springer rebel grabs Gramophone accolade

Why cats hate Mahler symphonies