Coming Up @ Fes Festival of World Sacred Music

Bab al Makina 20h30 -

Wadih El Safi,

WADIH EL SAFI  - Lebanon,  His real name is Francis Wadih Béchara, a Lebanese singer, oud player and composer. With more than 60 years' experience, an exceptional voice and more than 5000 song titles under his belt, he is widely considered to be the quintessential singer of the Arab world.Wadih El Safi retains the splendour of the Arab musical tradition and is regarded as a top performer of tarab in common with the tenor Sabah Fakhri. It's for this reason that he is known as the Voice of the Lebanon.

He started his artistic journey in 1938 at the early age of seventeen when he took part in a singing contest held by the Lebanese Broadcasting Network and was first among fifty other competitors. He was named then the first singer of Lebanon.

El Safi, a classically trained Baritone – having studied at the Beirut National Conservatory of Music -, began composing and performing songs that drew upon his rural upbringing and love of traditional melodies. He blended poetry and zajal with an urban sound, and created a new style of modernized Lebanese folk music. He performed in venues throughout the Middle East.

In 1947, El Safi traveled to Brazil, where he remained until 1950. After his return to Lebanon, El Safi continued to develop folk music and chose poetry and zajal to inspire patriotism and focus on love, devotion, morals and values.

Wadih El Safi toured the world, singing in many languages, including Arabic, French, Portuguese and Italian. He took part in major international festivals and earned many high distinction honors in Lebanon, Tunisia, Jordan, Yemen, Morocco, Syria, Mascat and France.

He has written over 3000 songs and is well known for his mawawil (an improvised singing style) of ‘ataba, mijana, and Abu el Zuluf. He has performed and recorded with many well-known Lebanese musicians, including Najwa Karam, Fairouz, and Sabah.

Wadih El Safi's fame came to the fore in 1957 during the well-known Baalbek Festival.

Lotfi Bouchnak

LOTFI BOUCHNAK - Tunisia  This singer, lutist and composer was born in Tunis into a family that was originally Turkish from Bosnia, as his surname suggests. Lotfi Bouchnak is an inspired artist with a powerful charisma that charms Arab audiences with the power of his voice, the extent of his vocal range and his exceptional expressive qualities.

Passionate about his art, Bouchnak is primarily devoted to the classical Arab repertoire of the old tradition. His interpretation of Tunisian music is audacious; he is an inspired oud player; he revives the traditions of the Golden Age when he sings the work of his namesake, the grand master of Aleppo, Mustafa al Bushnak (1770-1856). This was a time when such singers travelled across the Ottoman Empire and performed before princes of the East and West, providing a cosmopolitan form of art. This syncretic cosmopolitanism was influenced by the great Egyptian, Syrian, Iraqi, Tunisian and Turkish musicians such as Tawfiq Quwiwi (who was his master), Salih al Mahdi, Sayyid Darwish, Salih Abd al Hayy and Sabah Fakhri, and had a remarkable effect on his style where the inflections of the Middle East are coloured with Arabo-Andalus nuances.

In recent years, Lotfi Bouchnak has delighted music-lovers in Damascus, Baghdad, Cairo, Algiers and Amman. At the beginning of the 1990s, a fortuitous collaboration with the Al Kindi Ensemble contributed to his becoming known to a western, European audience. An artist of deep faith, he recorded a CD dedicated to the setting to music of the 99 Names of God.

Accompanied by a group of twelve traditional percussionists, Bouchnak's concert in Fes consists of a repertoire of sacred Sufi songs.

A REMINDER

The afternoon concert at Batha 4pm - Arabesques - France Spain
from the poems of the Diván del Tamarit by Federico Garcia Lorca interpreted by Rocío Màrquez. Melodies for song and piano by Christian Boissel

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Fes Festival - Night in the Medina - Night 3

Dar Adyel  - Terra Maïre - Medieval Sacred Songs of the Occitan People (France)

Beatrice and Marie-Ange 

“Terra Maïre” is a unique duo of a cappella singers. Two surprising voices, emanating from the same source – those of Marie-Ange and Beatrice, mother and daughter – with a common heredity and a common repertoire, rooted in the South of France, in the regions of Rouergue, the Basque Country and the Bearn.

It was back in 1996 that Beatrice and Marie-Ange decided to embark on a pilgrimage back to their roots.  Though mother and daughter, they have very separate personalities and artistic backgrounds. This diversity gave them the energy and ability to breathe life back into the secular songs of the land of their ancestors. These songs – prayers, laments, psalms – "chevrotés" or “sung in a quavering voice” by men and women who have gone before them and most of whom have disappeared, make up a unique heritage, a timeless tradition in danger of extinction.

In the intertwined voices of “Terra-Maïre” - “Mother Earth” in the Occitan language -  their arises a world of essential emotions, that tread the fine line between the sacred and sorcery. These are medieval and sacred melodies in Occitan, language of troubadours and Cathars. 

At Dar Adyel tonight Terra Maïre wove musical magic - producing ancient ghostly melodies that filled the night air. Their voices were ethereal, other-worldly and hypnotic. All performers on stage were barefoot and the symbolism was entirely appropriate - this was music that connected you from the earth under your feet, through your body and lifted your entire being to the skies above.

A delightful touch of the pagan

While one would sing a drone, a single constant pitch, slowly shifting her vowels to create unexpected textures, the other's sorrowful melodies took off from this grounding and wandered through the aural space. They alternated these roles until coming upon a moment at which they broke the pattern and sang lines in thirds, bringing surprise as well as harmonic closure to the pieces.

Also in harmony this evening was the lighting - a mix of ecclesiastical purple and pagan orange achieving just the right mix of heavenly sorcery. This was especially effective when Beatrice began to dance behind the stage, her swirling robes of Indian silk casting shadow images of a faery spirit, spinning and floating in a swirl of mysticism.

Frederic Cavallin and Claire Menguy

Anass Habib 

The participation of talented cello player Claire Menguy, drummer Frederic Cavallin on the tabla and bandir, accompaniment by Anass Habib and the plaintive tones of the Indian Shruti box all contributed to giving the performance the intensity of an initiatory experience.

This is not the first appearance in Fez for Terra Maïre and Fez music lovers will remember the delightful concert at Le Jardin Des Biehn in June 2011. Tonight was for them and for us - a welcome return.


Batha Museum - The Song of Songs and a Tribute to Mahmoud Darwish by Rodolphe Burger

A musical encounter between one of the most famous biblical texts attributed to King Solomon and the poetry of the Palestinian Mahmoud Darwish is a bold undertaking and one, judging by the audience reaction, that was successful. 

Rodolphe Burger, guitar, voice, Mehdi Haddab, oud, Rayess Bek, Arabic song, Ruth Rosenthal, Hebrew song, Yves Dormoy, electronics, clarinet, Julien Perraudeau , bass guitar and keyboard

Rodolphe Burger 

Rodolphe Burger is an interesting and complex character. At first glance most people would not expect a man, dressed like an American country & western singer and with the physique of a rugby player or lumberjack, to recite  softly spoken verses about love and longing. First impressions are dangerous. When Rodolphe Burger sat down at the microphone and began to speak it was to trade verses in French with the the Hebrew speaking Ruth Rosenthal.

The two performers could not be more different. Rosenthal is a petite, elven women, who nevertheless brings the same deep intensity to the lyrics of their first piece. Speaking mainly in Hebrew but occasionally in French, her delivery was augmented by the occasional solitary chime from a set of tingsha - the wonderfully onomatopoeic name for Tibetan brass hand cymbals. The sweet crisp sound rang brightly in the clear night air.

This is polished material - the words not so much recited, but lived; every breath, every nuance perfectly delivered. The effect was one of intimacy, as though the audience were eavesdropping on a love scene that was passionate and sensual.

The accompaniment of the Song of Songs was at first purely the domain of Yves Dormoy and his electronic wizardry. It complimented but never stole the limelight. Burger's guitar was used to good effect, but again, it was the two voices speaking of love that remained dominent.

'For lo, the winter is past
the rain is over and gone;
the flowers appear on the earth;
the time of the singing of birds is come,
and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land;
the fig tree putteth forth her green figs,
and the vines with the tender grape give a good smell.
Arise, my love, my fair one, and come away.' -  Song of Songs

'How much do you wish to place my soul-searching into the beaks of these doves?
So that it disappears over the slopes of the horizon -
so that I know that you are Babel, Egypt and Sham
Fly away doves,
alight doves.' - Mahmoud Darwish

The second piece was poetry from Mahmoud Darwish was given a more robust musical arrangement with the oud of Mehdi Haddab, giving the audience a spirited introduction that left nobody in doubt about his musical abilities.  With the Darwish poems it was the turn of Arabic speaking Rayess Bek to join the recitation. His delivery, though heartfelt, was not as emotive or engaging as that of the talented duo of Rosenthal and Burger.

Mehdi Haddab

The previous night, in the same venue with Rabbi Haim Louk, we experienced matrouz with its joyful melding of Arabic and Hebrew. Tonight we examined the same melding with the addition of French but the style was a universe away from that of the Rabbi.

There was nothing "folksy" here. At times the music behind the beautifully spoken verses in Hebrew and French sounded like electronic meditation music that belonged in some New Age spa, and yet the combination worked.

Reaching beyond his roots in blues, rock and country, Rodolphe Burger creates a musical universe that's constantly expanding: between mutant rock, obsessive circles of melancholia, a jungle of samples, electronics, acid or lunar. He is bravely plotting a course towards a new musical horizon. A place where the avant-garde and tradition can combine. Along this journey the audience senses the profundity of the roots of semitic, biblical and contemporary Arab poetry.  This was an interesting journey and one on which the audience went along in true Fes Festival fashion.

A NOTE ABOUT MAHMOUD DARWISH

Mahmoud Darwish (Arabic: محمود درويش‎) (13 March 1941 – 9 August 2008) was a Palestinian poet and author who won numerous awards for his literary output and was regarded as the Palestinian national poet. In his work, Palestine became a metaphor for the loss of Eden, birth and resurrection, and the anguish of dispossession and exile.

Darwish published over thirty volumes of poetry and eight books of prose.

Darwish's early writings are in the classical Arabic style. He wrote monorhymed poems adhering to the metrics of traditional Arabic poetry. In the 1970s he began to stray from these precepts and adopted a "free-verse" technique that did not abide strictly by classical poetic norms. The quasi-Romantic diction of his early works gave way to a more personal, flexible language, and the slogans and declarative language that characterised his early poetry were replaced by indirect and ostensibly apolitical statements, although politics was never far away.

Streets encircle us
As we walk among the bombs.
Are you used to death?
I'm used to life and to endless desire.
Do you know the dead?
I know the ones in love.

Dar Mokri - Al Arabi Ensemble (Morocco)

My heart can take on any form:
A meadow for gazelles,
A cloister for monks,
For the idols, sacred ground,
Ka'ba for the circling pilgrim,
The tables of the Torah,
The scrolls of the Quran.
My creed is Love;
Wherever its caravan turns along the way,
That is my belief,
My faith. -   Ibn Arabi

This Ensemble takes its inspiration from the repertoire of the zaouïa, the great poets like Ibn Arabi after whom they are named, and others such as Ibn Faridh, Al Shushtari, Al Harraq and the great Rabbi Al Adawiya. The Ensemble has evolved over the years and represents the great Arab-Andalus tradition.

Marouane Hajji.

The treat of the evening was the exquisite voice of rising star Marouane Hajji. Born in Fez in 1987, Hajji is a violinist and Moroccan Sufi singer with considerable charisma. His pure tones soared above the combined voices of the Ensemble, conveying transcendent spirituality. He sang with his eyes closed, an expression of bliss on his boyish, handsome face.

Hajji began singing at the age of five, studying under the tutelage of Sheikh Haj Mohammed Bennis, at the Mederssa Rachidite in Ras Echarratine, and with teachers at the Fez Conservatory of Music. In 1998, he won first place in a competition held at the National Festival of Singers in Fez for his ability to captivate an audience, the power of his voice and originality of his performance - all qualities that were clearly evident in his performance tonight.

The audience, predominantly local Moroccans, thoroughly enjoyed the evening.


Reviews, reports and photographs: Vanessa Bonnin, Sandy McCutcheon, Suzanna Clark

TOMORROW'S FÈS FESTIVAL WEATHER

Tomorrow's Programme
Thursday June 14th

14.30 – 18.30 @ Houria Cultural Complex
Children’s Activities
Expressions of Body and Soul / Calligraphy / Theatre

16.00 @ Batha Museum
Arabesques: Rocío Màrquez, voice and Christian Boissel, piano and composition
Poems from the Diván del Tamarit by Federico Garcia Lorca (France and Spain)

20.30 @ Bab Al Makina
Wadi El Safi & Lotfi Bouchnak (Lebanon and Tunisia)

22.00 @ Bab Boujloud Square – free entry
Leila Mrini
Nabila Maan

23.00 @ Dar Tazi – free entry
Sufi Nights
Issawiya Brotherhood: Night of the Mkadmins (Fes)


FÈS FESTIVAL QUICK LIST

Festival Programme
Festival in the City
Sufi Nights
Festival Forums
Festival Eating Guide
Art during the Festival #1
Art during the Festival #2
The Enchanted Gardens of Fez
Last Minute Accommodation

Reporting: Vanessa Bonnin, Sandy McCutcheon
Photographs: Suzanna Clarke, Sandy McCutcheon, Vanessa Bonnin

The View from Fez is an official Media Partner of the Fès Festival of World Sacred Music

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Fes Forums - Visions of the Bird of Wonder

This afternoon, in the cool of an air conditioned conference room at Palais Jamaï, Michael Barry gave a presentation on his book, Visions of the Bird of Wonder, reports Vivian Nguyen.

Alpine swift above Fez

Visions of the Bird of Wonder is co-authored with French professor, Leili Anvar, who was not present for the lecture.

The book focuses on how the image of the bird has travelled across religious and figurative borders, and is based on the work of Shaykh Fari Attâr's Canticle of the Birds to Saint Francis of Assisi's Canticle of the World's Creatures.

Barry, (pictured, left), who is American-born and French-educated, is a professor in Persian at Princeton University. He presented images from the book in a slideshow, while explaining the bird's significance in a series of Persian miniature paintings.

He first explained how the image of the bird in Persian texts was linked to the Christian tradition, but also to the Buddhist and Hindu religions as well.

Barry also put a few myths to rest in regard to the Taliban's ban on girls attending school by showing images featuring schoolgirls in 18th century Afghanistan. Contrary to popular opinion, he also emphasised that the images were important to Muslim culture not only in Asia, but also in the Shia tradition which is dominant in Iran, as well as the orthodox Sunni Islamic tradition as well.

One of the major points that Barry made focused on how the bird represents the soul's aspiration to move to and be closer to God. Additionally, its ability for flight represents the soul's desire to aspire to a higher sense of self.

This sentiment of the bird is a universal one, he said. The bird also adopted a male and female form in Barry's work, representing different aspects of divinity. Often, the bird represented the female form.

Overall, Barry wowed his audience with erudition and beauty, and kept the crowd spellbound for two hours. Outside on the terrace of the Palais Jamaï, the birds did not seem to be listening to the lecture, but rather, were singing.

Barry's lecture was a great example of how the Festival is not just about music or debates, but also serves as a great site for art exhibitions and history, showcasing beauty in all its forms in the Muslim world.

For more information about the lecture, please visit www.fesfestival.com.

Waddick Doyle contributed to this report.

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Fès Festival - A Night in the Medina - 2nd Night

The second of the Nights in the Medina went ahead without a hitch. Despite the last minute swapping of concerts between Dar Mokri and the Batha Museum, all concerts were well attended. The obvious reason for the change of venues was the expected crowd for Rabbi Haim Louk. The organisers got this right. The Batha Museum was the right venue for the Rabbi, and even then, it was packed to capacity.

Once again the people of the Medina welcomed the hordes of visitors with typical Fassi hospitality. Security and signage was first rate.

THE CONCERTS

Dar Mokri - Nour Ensemble – Christian polyphony and Persian mystical song (France & Iran)

Walking into Dar Mokri and hearing the sound of polyphonic a capella was a wonderful welcome to a concert whose only problem was that it was too short. The blend of influences from East and West melded like the perfect spice mix; hints of Gregorian plain-song, Spanish cantigas and the evocative music of a Persian Oud.
..

Well performed polyphonic singing takes the individual voices and makes them into a whole that is more than the parts. The five voices on stage at Dar Mokri achieved this perfectly. So much so that the inclusion of the Persian traditional instruments - percussion, oud and whistle - while played exceptionally well, never produced in the listener the same deep serenity from which a true feeling of spiritual pleasure emanates.

The Nour Ensemble move between sacred Occidental polyphonies to the declamation of mystical Persian song. But it is the polyphony that wins out every time. It is the pure essence of the sound that makes its appeal universal. These are the sounds that can be heard in churches or on the docks of Croatian fishing villages, in the canto a tenore groups in Sardinia and the gorgeous women's voices from Pirin in Bulgaria.

Barbara from Chicago was in the audience and told The View from Fez that... "the singing was so gorgeous I felt light headed"

Had she been around in medieval times she would have had many who agreed with her, but who did not necessarily think the music induced feeling was a good thing  The sensual indulgence that polyphonic singing offers caused it to be labeled non-spiritual - even evil.

It was not merely polyphony that offended the medieval ears, but fear of secular music merging with the sacred and making its way into the papal court. It gave church music more of a jocular performance quality removing the solemn element of worship. Harmony was not only considered frivolous, impious, and lascivious, but an obstruction to the audibility of the words. Instruments, as well as certain modes, were actually forbidden in the church because of their association with secular music and pagan rites. After banishing polyphony from the Liturgy in 1322, Pope John XXII spoke in his 1324 Bull Docta Sanctorum Patrum warning against the unbecoming elements of this musical innovation.

Thankfully such history is behind us and the Nour Ensemble showed us tonight how East and West can come together in harmony.

Click here for  a musical bonus


Batha - Rabbi Haim Louk and the Arab-Andalus Ensemble of Fes – The Art of Matrouz: Arabic and Hebrew poetry.

Rabbi Haim Louk 

It was probably impossible to squeeze another person into the Batha Museum venue. The huge crowd knew what to expect. Rabbi Haim Louk was heading the bill and so it was "party time with the Rabbi".

The Rabbi in a playful mood

There is no doubt that Rabbi Haim Louk is a scholar and a man well versed in Sephardic poetry and liturgy but above all he is a superb showman. From the moment he walked on stage he had the audience in the palm of his hand and had their hands clapping along.

Rabbi Louk was born in Casablanca, Morocco in 1942. He became famous at a very young age as a musical prodigy. Blessed with a beautiful voice and tremendous talent, he has produced scores of audio recordings of the authentic Moroccan Jewish liturgy. Internationally recognised as a virtuoso of classical Andalusian music, Rabbi Louk has given recitals to rave reviews in Morocco, Israel, Spain, France, Belgium, Canada, Poland, and the United States.

While Rabbi Louk was centre stage, those he shared it with, the Arab-Andalus Ensemble of Fes, directed by Abderahim Souiri, made a great contribution to the performance. The percussion and particularly the violin playing was up there trading licks with the Rabbi. The high spirits on stage were evident amongst the Arab-Andalous musicians and that spirit was infectious. Even those in the crowd who did not understand the words were moved.

Pierre Deladeriere, Fes resident and second time festival attendee said - "Unfortunately I don't understand the words but it's a very strong, good energy and this energy brings a hope of happiness. It's formidable because the energy is diffused to all the spectators and it creates a mood of solidarity. Everyone is in the same mood even if we don't understand the words."

The meeting of the two cultures is the matrouz that subtly mixes Arabic and Hebrew words. As Fr Joseph Chetrit put it..."This embroidery of poetic words of poems from all epochs, down the ages, of all types and on all subjects, this matrouz, is the soul and the very essence of multiculturality. A culture that is plural cannot but embroider its differences and its different elements. Life is embroidery. One embroiders in every sense."

Tonight at the Batha Museum the audience were enthralled by this embroidery. A generous, spirited and joyful performance had both the crowd and the musicians grinning from ear to ear. There was a lot of love in the room.

Dar Adyel - Cherifa, Berber poetess of the Middle Atlas Mountains 

The second night at Dar Adyel showcased another female Moroccan singer, but there the similarity ended. Exuberantly dressed in hot pink and black flowing robes, Cherifa, the Berber poetess, was imbued with a joyful energy that was palpable.

A headband adorned with sequins and colourful threads held back her flowing black hair and both she and her musicians proudly wore Tamazigh letters embroidered on their costumes.

“We wear these symbols to represent Tamazigh culture to the world,” Cherifa told The View From Fez after the concert.

She began singing as a child and said she was self-taught: “My voice was a gift from God.” However she listed her greatest musical inspirations as the singers Hadawaki, Rwicha and Ben Nasrouk Khoya.

“I am very happy when I am singing,” she continued. “I love music and people and people love me.”

And love her the audience certainly did. Accompanied by a violin, a lawtar and drums the concert quickly built up to a joyful crescendo, the violinist’s fingers flying and the instrument (held vertically) pivoting on his knee.

Her plaintive but powerful voice sounded as if it was suited to calling across mountain valleys and being flung out at the sky. At one point she sat cross legged on the stage to engage more fully with the audience, and with a shimmy of her shoulders showed the crowd how to dance sitting down.

Others preferred to stand though, and enthusiastic lines of dancers, arms linked, showed their appreciation in true Moroccan style.

A truly joyful concert.

*Bjork spotting continues – she was in the audience and sat amongst the crowd on the carpet, captivated by the music, a half smile on her face and swaying to the rhythm.

TOMORROW'S WEATHER

Tomorrow's Programme
Wednesday June 13th
9.00 – 12.00 @ Batha Museum – free entry
Fes Forum: Giving a Soul to Globalisation
Theme – Towards a Strategy for Civilisation

14.30 – 18.30 @ Houria Cultural Complex
Children’s Activities
Expressions of Body and Soul / Calligraphy / Theatre

15.00 @ Palais Jamai, seminar room – free entry
Lecture of Michael Barry presented by Saad Khiari: Sun Bird, Soul Bird and Bird of Wonder - From Shaykh Attâr’s “Canticle of the Birds” to Saint Francis of Assisi’s “Canticle of the World’s Creatures”: visions of the Bird of Wonder.
Presentation of the book “Les 50 Noms de l’Amour; Le Jardin des Amoureux” by Fatima Mernissi

20.00 @ Dar Mokri (Nights in the Medina)
Al Arabi Ensemble (Morocco)

20.00 @ Dar Adyel (Nights in the Medina)
Terra Maïre - Medieval Sacred Songs of the Occitan People (France)

21.00 @ Batha Museum (Nights in the Medina)
The Song of Songs and a Tribute to Mahmoud Darwich by Rodolphe Burger

22.00 @ Dar Mokri (Nights in the Medina)
Al Arabi Ensemble (Morocco)

22.00 @ Dar Adyel (Nights in the Medina)
Terra Maïre - Medieval Sacred Songs of the Occitan People (France)

22.00 @ Bab Boujloud Square – free entry
Festival in the City
Asmae Lazrek
Abderrahim Souiri

23.00 @ Dar Tazi – free entry
Sufi Nights
Darkawiya Brotherhood (Essaouira)


FÈS FESTIVAL QUICK LIST

Festival Programme
Festival in the City
Sufi Nights
Festival Forums
Festival Eating Guide
Art during the Festival #1
Art during the Festival #2
The Enchanted Gardens of Fez
Last Minute Accommodation

Reporting: Vanessa Bonnin, Sandy McCutcheon
Photographs: Suzanna Clarke, Sandy McCutcheon, Vanessa Bonnin

The View from Fez is an official Media Partner of the Fès Festival of World Sacred Music


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Cantica Symphonia @ the Batha Museum

This afternoon’s performance by the Cantica Symphonia was an uplifting experience, with wonderful polyphonic harmonies that hung suspended in the air under the cathedral-like dome of the ancient tree at Batha Museum.However, as it was explained to the audience during the concert, the music is designed to be heard and sung in a real church, rather than a natural one, and the acoustics of the garden setting are completely different. The wind blowing the sheet music across the stage was certainly an element that the musicians weren’t used to! Vanessa Bonnin and Sandy McCutcheon report.

 Giuseppe Maletto conducting Cantica Symphonia

Cantica Symphonia

Since 1995 Cantica Symphonia has dedicated itself to the recovery and performance of medieval and renaissance polyphony. Founded by Giuseppe Maletto and Svetlana Fomina, the group is now one of the most highly regarded interpreters in its field.

Cantica Symphonia’s unique style, fruit of intensive analysis of original sources, is characterised by an ability to bring out the structural and expressive richness of its repertoire. The group’s approach is one of particular care and attention to the interaction between voices and instruments, consolidating the collective experience of its members who individually collaborate with the most highly affirmed groups of today’s international Early Music scene.

The fulcrum of the group’s activity has always been the music of Guillaume Dufay, the first great musician of the “modern” era whose works enlightened his times and guided western music through the travailed passage from medieval to renaissance.

The music of Guillaume Dufay

Polyphony

In music, polyphony is a texture consisting of two or more independent melodic voices, as opposed to music with just one voice (monophony) or music with one dominant melodic voice accompanied by chords (homophony).

Traditional polyphony has a wide, if uneven distribution among the peoples of the world. Most polyphonic regions of the world are sub-Saharan Africa, Europe and Oceania. It is believed that origins of polyphony in traditional music vastly predates the emergence of polyphony in European music.

European polyphony rose out of melismatic organum, the earliest harmonisation of the chant. Twelfth century composers, such as Léonin and Pérotin developed the organum that was introduced centuries earlier, and also added a third and fourth voice to the chant.

This concert was presented in collaboration with the MITO Settembre Musica.

THE CONCERT

The seven members of the Cantica Symphonia were given a warm reception at the Batha Museum. The line-up of two male voices and one female were supported by two trombones, a vielle and a "positive" organ. The vielle, played by the ensemble's co-founder, Svetlana Fomina,  is a European bowed stringed instrument used in the Medieval period, similar to a modern violin but with a somewhat longer and deeper body, five (rather than four) gut strings, and a leaf-shaped pegbox with frontal tuning pegs.

 The vielle 

The instrument was also known as a fidel or a viuola, although the French name for the instrument, vielle, is generally used. It was one of the most popular instruments of the Medieval period, and was used by troubadours and jongleurs from the 13th through the 15th centuries.

The vielle possibly derived from the lira, a Byzantine bowed instrument closely related to the rebab, an Arab bowed instrument, has a deeper and lustrous sound than its cousin the violin.

The portable "positive" organ is of a type common in sacred and secular music between the 10th and the 18th centuries, in chapels and small churches, as a chamber organ and for the basso continuo in ensemble works.

The ensemble, lead by Giuseppe Maletto, lived up to their reputation for finely nuanced performance. Two sections of a rarely performed Missa - the Kyrie eleison and the Gloria - opened the concert and left the audience in no doubt that they were at a spiritual music festival.

As the concert progressed into the realms of polyphony, the vocal work was superb. The soprano's voice, sometimes soaring like a bird, at other times fluttering gracefully from note to note on the breeze. Richly textured; this was sweet and delicate music. Always vibrant, yet, at times so soft as it lingered on the edge of hearing before vanishing into the realms of memory. In the quiet moments the singers were accompanied by the singing of birds from the Barbary Oak.

The last piece they performed was written for the consecration of the cathedral in Florence, Italy. The voices are meant to echo and respond. The audience was asked to try and imagine how it would sound in a great cathedral – but to help achieve the echoing effect, the two trombonists were positioned behind the audience.

The audience were content to let the music wash over them

Regular festival attendee Lynn Evans Davidson from Cornwall said the music was transcendental.
“I felt my whole body melting and drifting up,” she said. “I was also thinking that on this same stage we’ve had Sufism, yesterday’s wonderful music from India and now this ancient European music, and each of them has it’s own fashion of reaching you. This music brings peace of heart, whereas the Hamdushiyya was a swelling of the heart and a connection and sharing of the experience, and the Rajasthani music was just pure joy!”

One factor the musicians had never experienced was the commencement of the call to prayer. The fusion of Muslim and Christian religious songs was an interesting interlude that broke the serious tone of the afternoon when the perplexed musicians started laughing, along with the audience.

A beautiful concert.

Happy with the reception - Francesca Cassinari - soprano

Text: Sandy McCutcheon and Vanessa Bonnin 
Photographs: Sandy McCutcheon and Vanessa Bonnin

FÈS FESTIVAL QUICK LIST

Festival Programme
Festival in the City
Sufi Nights
Festival Forums
Festival Eating Guide
Art during the Festival #1
Art during the Festival #2
The Enchanted Gardens of Fez
Last Minute Accommodation

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Fes Forums - Day four

Faouzi Skali, Director General of the Spirit of Fes Foundation, with academic Tariq Ramadan

Much like yesterday's Forum discussion on the contradictory yet complementary relationship between business and spirituality, today's Forum topic Financial crisis or civilizational crisis? focused on the fundamental nature of today's crises (and indeed there are many). The inherently oppositional relationship of capitalism and markets, on the one hand, and spirituality and what is best in humankind on the other, is what the crisis in civilization is about, reports Vivian Nguyen. 

Tariq Ramadan, Swiss academic and professor at Oxford University, launched into this debate by urging the crowd to consider the inherent relationship that exists between the two concepts.

"When we talk about the financial and the economical concerns...we are faced with the fact that we must deal with humans and the philosophy of life," said Ramadan.

For Ramadan, to understand the root of a financial crisis, we must first focus on analyzing man's daily practices, as well as his intellectual and social involvements. This will help provide a proper framework for recognizing the different ways and forms from which a crisis is born.

Ramadan was also critical of the Muslim world, which he claims is not currently producing thinkers who have considered financial, social, or human alternatives to address financial and civilization crises.

A reform, or an alternative to consider these issues, must be adopted, he says. One alternative Ramadan posed was the teaching and reflection of the humanism of faith as a core part of all educational curricula.

"I think we should integrate religion, not ritual, into the philosophy of man," said Ramadan. "Religion doesn't mean we pray at certain times of the day as we do in Islam, but defining man — who he is. Man should know who he is".

Today's other panelists, Assia Alaoui Bensalah, Bensalem Himmich, Pierre Laffitte, Katherine Marshall, and Patrick Viveret, provided an additional framework to consider the issues that Ramadan posed, as well as offering their own indicators to evaluate financial and civilizational crises, such as through new technology or one's own happiness.

While today marks the final day of the Forum, there will be a lecture from Michael Barry and Leila Anvar, as presented by Saad Khiari, at Palais Jamaï tomorrow afternoon at 15h00. For more information, please visit www.fesfestival.com.

See also: Vivian's reports
Fes Forums Day One
Fes Forums Day Two
Fes Forums Day Three

FÈS FESTIVAL QUICK LIST

Festival Programme
Festival in the City
Sufi Nights
Festival Forums
Festival Eating Guide
Art during the Festival #1
Art during the Festival #2
The Enchanted Gardens of Fez
Last Minute Accommodation

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Fès Festival Fringe - Gallery talk

Textile collector Michel Biehn

On Wednesday June 13 at 6pm at Galerie du Jardin des Biehn, textile collector Michel Biehn and artist Margaret Lanzetta will discuss the works and the connections between them in their joint exhibition, Seven Types of Terrain.

As a Festival fringe event, the theme of a dialogue between two types of media - textiles and paintings, is an appropriate one. While Lanzetta's paintings play with elements of patterns, the colourful embroidered and woven pieces from Biehn's collection show us something of the origins and development of those patterns in the Islamic world.

"I started to collect textiles about 30 years ago," says Michel Biehn. "I was at a dinner party with an historian who was preparing an exhibition on Kashmiri shawls. Suddenly doors opened up, and I realised there were all these stories (behind them) about trade, wars, and wealth. So I began to collect more."

Biehn says in those days textiles were not as valued as they are now, because they were seen as being part of the female realm.

His growing passion for collecting and dealing in textiles took him all over the planet, to Asia and the Middle East, until he had accumulated thousands of pieces. Then his house in Provence was filled with them.

"Textiles started in the East; in China around 3000 BC, with silk, indigo, block prints and weaving techniques. They spread across the Middle East to Europe, through Florence and Venice."

These days Biehn focuses on clothing. "I've sold all the pieces that could be used in a home and kept the costumes - the tunics, hats and veils. They speak of the people who wore them."

Of Seven Types of Terrain, Biehn says he is delighted with how well the show has come up.

"The pieces work very well together," he says. "Most of the textiles are Islamic. It is almost a rule that you have to allow mistakes (when they are being made), because perfection is only from God."

Seven Types of Terrain is on until June 18 at Galerie du Jardin des Biehn, 13 Akbat Sbaa, Douh, Fes Medina. Hear Michel Biehn and Margaret Lanzetta talk about the dialogue between their works tomorrow night (Wednesday) from 6pm.



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Behind the Scenes @ the Fes Festival of World Sacred Music - Zeyba Rahman

If you have seen an elegant, attractive woman with long dark hair introducing performers and speakers on stage at the Fes Festival of World Sacred Music, you may be surprised to know the extent of the role she plays. The woman is Zeyba Rahman. Suzanna Clarke spoke to her for The View from Fez.

New York based Zeyba Rahman is the Director, Asia and North America, Fes Festival and Forum and in charge of international programs and partnerships; she helped develop the Fes Forum, as well as being a professional artistic director, film producer and art curator. She has encouraged the development of the Fes Festival off and on since 1998 and ran the Spirit of Fes North American tours in 2004 and 2006. Rahman was also the creative force behind the public programs of the Metropolitan Museum of Art for the re-opening of its fifteen new galleries of the Arab Lands, Turkey, Iran, Central Asia and Later South Asia. It was a historic moment when the galleries opened in November 2011, with the museum's department of Islamic Art creating a Moroccan courtyard with artisans from Fes. And this is only a selection of her many accomplishments.

In 1998, Rahman decided to bring a group of music lovers from New York to the Festival, without ever having visited Fez before.

“I was naturally drawn to the humanitarian goals (of the Festival), and the spirit and culture of the ancient city of Fez. When I first came, I felt very connected, in an instant.”

Fez was also where she first met Icelandic singer Bjork, who will perform at the Festival on Friday night. “That year Bjork was in Fes on a private visit," Rahman says. "I was with Jon Pareles, the Chief World Music Critic for The New York Times and we were listeing to some Issaoua (Sufi music) in a private home. Jon said, “Look in the doorway.” There was a pixie-like figure in a pink tutu, wearing a beaver fur hat in summer, and 50’s style pom-pom bedroom slippers. Bjork was staying at Palais Jamais; had been asleep when she heard the music, and followed the sound until she found it.”

They spent time hanging out and attending performances together. Rahman is thrilled that Bjork has returned this year to make her Festival debut. “She has a special place in our heart in Fez.”

Also on that visit, Rahman met the Fes Festival’s founder and Director General of the Spirit of Fes Foundation, Faouzi Skali, and they discovered many shared values, including a deep appreciation of Sufism. “He asked me to represent the Festival in North America,” she says. In 2004 and 2006 Rahman ran the Spirit of Fes North American tour, which represented the best of the Festival to 17 cities across 11 states. It was a hugely successful undertaking. “I would love to see us picking up the international touring program again,” she says.

In 2007, Rahman left the Festival when Faouzi Skali ceased working for it, and rejoined last year when he returned. The Festival’s achievements of which she is most proud include the free program, “so Fassis can have access to the Festival.” She says she is delighted by how much the program, known as “Festival in the City” has expanded. “We now have international artists performing for it specifically.”

Rahman believes the Fes Forum is a "natural progression of the Festival" and remains deeply interested in furthering its development. She feels it’s important to have an opportunity to discuss the humanitarian issues underlying the Festival, in an atmosphere of “informality and intimacy”.

Born in India, Rahman’s parents were academics at Aligarh Muslim University in Uttar Pradesh. “They created music and film festivals”, she says. From an early age, she was exposed to diverse sources of music, from Bob Dylan and Joan Baez, to Sufi and classical sounds. She studied Indian classical singing from the age of six. “If I could do my life over again, I would do more with music,” she confesses. “I love it when you sing a note and you become one with that note.”

Rahman’s Afghan mother was an excellent amateur pianist, but as a Muslim woman was discouraged from performing, so chose to follow an academic career. When Rahman was 13 years old, the family moved to New York, where her mother undertook Phd studies. And there they stayed.

Rahman describes herself as a “detail-oriented person”, which is naturally a valuable quality in playing a major role in the growing Festival. “I like preparation so I can anticipate instead of reacting.”

Ways in which Rahman would like to see the Fes Festival develop include the continuation and expansion of specially commissioned musical works, such as this year’s Tribute to Omar Khayyam; artistic residencies which offer local and international artists the opportunity to develop works, with the possibility of touring them, plus an expansion of the successful Nights in the Medina program. “Fes is such a feast for the senses”, she says.

Rahman would like to see the continuation of an integrated, holistic approach to the Festival. “The visual side needs development,” she admits.

As for her continuing involvement, Rahman is taking it one step at a time. “For me the Festival is a priority. It speaks to my heart. It’s important to continue the work.”

The View from Fez could not agree more.

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Fès Festival - A Night in the Medina - first night

The first of the Nights in the Medina was received well by almost all patrons of the festival. Many commented on the fact that the venues were well-signposted and thought that the candles lining the streets enhanced the atmosphere.

Other comments noted the impressive security presence and immaculate streets. Local residents said “it would be nice if the streets were this clean and felt this safe all the time – if they can do it during the Festival, why not all year round?”

Negative comments from attendees highlighted the fact that it was impossible to buy a ticket to a single concert and some were forced to pay for three that it was not possible to actually use. This is a valid point and one that hopefully the festival will address next year. It should be possible to buy tickets to each individual concert. Especially as to see all three concerts is very rushed, particularly when they don’t start on time. Efficiency with this type of schedule is paramount and it just wasn't possible to see all the concerts without missing some parts of the performances, or arriving late and being unable to find a seat.

Dar Mokri - Vahdat sisters from Iran


The Vahdat sisters, Mahsa and Marjan, from Iran, presented mystical poems with Pasha Hanjani playing the ney.

The sisters, belong to a new generation of musicians; university educated and totally dedicated to the cause of art, expressing the continuity of a tradition while facing the problem of identity in modern Iran. Ancient miniatures and antique paintings show that women in Persia have performed both in court and in public life. Though, "âvâz" was music more for men and showcasing classical poems, the tasnif, repertoire of songs is more commonly performed by men and women.

Persian music, in its ability to constantly regenerate itself, is part of a unique phenomenon in the East. More than being faithful to a pure historical transmission, it favors an authenticity of emotion. Mahsa and Marjan Vahdat bring graceful and proud Persian poetry to new and open spaces.

THE CONCERT

The gentle introductory music on the ney (wooden flute) was absorbingly evocative; painting often bleak windswept landscapes. The sound, so gentle and breathy, was reminiscent of the Japanese shakuhachi, yet once the voices of the Vahdat sisters entered that landscape they transformed it into a realm of love, longing and devotion.

This was music of the heart;  soft, soothing and transporting. 

However, the venue Dar Mokri, has a serious sight-line problem, exacerbated by the phalanx of TV cameras. Two-thirds of the audience had little or no visual contact with the performers.  Thankfully the photo-journalists were able to crouch beneath the central courtyard fountain and thus not impede the view. 

The concert was superb and hopefully in future years we may get a chance to experience the Varhdat sisters in a more suitable venue such as the Batha Museum.


Batha Museum - Mory Djely Kouyaté and Jean-Philippe Rykiel - France-Guinea

THE CONCERT

This evening was a perfect combination of factors - a balmy night, a great venue and superb musicians. While the program notes spoke of Mory Djely Kouyaté's trademark deep voice having the ability to convey "grave and broken emotions and his vocal intensity portraying the dramatic forces of nature and suffering of exodus", the program forgot to mention his sense of humour and exuberant joy. Mory Djely Kouyaté is a Mandingo griot from Conakry in West Africa and, as such, is first and foremost an entertainer and storyteller.

Teamed up with the extraordinary talent of Jean-Philippe Rykiel, a pianist steeped in African influences, it was a marriage made in heaven.

Alec Schweikert from Seattle told The View From Fez that he really enjoyed the performance. “I thought it was an interesting mix of classical Western piano and African singing – I was surprised that they melded together that well. The two of them had a great rapport which made it work.”

It is not really a surprise that West African music and jazz should combine so perfectly, given that Africa was the home address of jazz.  Yet, the jazz that Jean-Philippe Rykiel brought to the union was a jazz that had strayed far from its roots.  As a pianist he is a follower of both the electronic explorations of Pierre Henry and the bebop of Thelonious Monk. Jean-Philippe has also played alongside Lokua Kanza, Salif Keita, Papa Wemba, Youssou N ' Dour and the Super Rail Band.

Kouyaté dominated the stage with great presence, a huge voice and a theatrical performance style that was reminiscent of an opera singer. Pacing with the microphone, flinging his arms wide, holding the high notes and posing for the cameras, he quickly won the hearts of the audience who readily joined in clapping and singing. In deference to the program notes about his gravitas, he was also able to bring the emotion down tempo; singing some slower numbers with great feeling.

This was a sparkling and elevating evening of music performed by a couple of musicians enjoying themselves and transmitting their joy and playfulness to the audience. If there was a "suffering of exodus", it was that the concert ended and we had to wend our way home.

Congratulations to the Artistic Director for this superb programming.

*Celebrity buffs take note: spotted at the concert was Bjork who is performing this Friday. She slipped in wearing a blue hat and blue dress and watched the concert for an hour from the back, before being whisked away by a small entourage.

Dar Adiyel - Ihsan Rmiki and the Zaman Al Wasl Ensemble Morocco 

The performances of Ihsan Rmiki of Sama'a and Madih have been described as "wine to drink for a soul in search of ecstasy". She owes her musical knowledge to the teaching she received in the conservatories of El Qasr Al-Kabir in the north of Morocco and in Marrakesh.

Ihsan Rmiki loves singing mouwachahates Al Andalus, an Arabic musical tradition that evokes the mythical cities of the East: Aleppo, Damascus and Cairo. Her inspiration is inhabited by the "Bustan" - the garden symbol of Arab-Andalusia.

In Morocco, the garden has a secular history that begins in the twelfth century and has its roots in the Persian Islamic tradition. At once sensual and mystical, the Arab-Andalusian garden, often jealously guarded by walls that cut off the noises of the world and abrasive intrusions of the sun, seems to want to echo a vision of paradise.

THE CONCERT

Seven black clad musicians took to the stage and waited in silence forthe main attraction – Ihsan Rmiki – to arrive. Suddenly they stood to attention as Rmiki, wearing a red, black and gold caftan with heels so high she had to be helped onto the stage, took her place.

The silence was broken by her reciting a poem in Arabic, accompanied by the gentle plucking of the zither strings and the tinkling of the central fountain at Dar Adiyel.

Then, as she began to sing with evident emotion, it was apparent that her voice didn’t need the added stature provided by the high heels. Clasping her hands as if in prayer, her flawless melodical voice soared and dipped like the swifts over the Medina ramparts at dusk.

Adding to the atmosphere was the intimate venue, with the audience sitting barefoot on carpets, surrounded by beautiful carved plaster and cedar wood moucharabia balconies.

TOMORROW'S WEATHER

Tomorrow's Programme
Tuesday June 12th

9.00 – 12.00 @ Batha Museum
Fes Forum: Giving a Soul to Globalisation
Theme – Financial crisis or Civilisational crisis?

14.30 – 18.30 @ Houria Cultural Complex
Children’s Activities
Expressions of Body and Soul / Calligraphy / Theatre

16.00 @ Batha Museum
Classical performance in collaboration with the MITO Settembre Musica by Guillaume Dufay (Italy)

20.00 @ Dar Mokri (Nights in the Medina)
Rabbi Haim Louk and the Arab-Andalus Ensemble of Fes, directed by Abderahim Souiri – The Art of Matrouz: Arabic and Hebrew poetry

20.00 @ Dar Adyel (Nights in the Medina)
Cherifa, Berber poetess of the Middle Atlas Mountains (Morocco)

21.00 @ Batha Museum (Nights in the Medina)
Nour Ensemble – Christian polyphony and Persian mystical song (France & Iran)

22.00 @ Dar Mokri (Nights in the Medina)
Rabbi Haim Louk and the Arab-Andalus Ensemble of Fes directed by Abderahim Souiri – The Art of Matrouz: Arabic and Hebrew poetry

22.00 @ Dar Adyel (Nights in the Medina)
Cherifa, Berber poetess of the Middle Atlas Mountains (Morocco)

22.00 @ Bab Boujloud Square – free entry
Festival in the City
Badr Rami (Syria)
Fouad Zbadi (Morocco)

23.00 @ Dar Tazi – free entry
Sufi Nights
Machichiya Brotherhood (Tangier)

FÈS FESTIVAL QUICK LIST

Festival Programme
Festival in the City
Sufi Nights
Festival Forums
Festival Eating Guide
Art during the Festival #1
Art during the Festival #2
The Enchanted Gardens of Fez
Last Minute Accommodation

Reporting: Vanessa Bonnin, Sandy McCutcheon
Photographs: Suzanna Clarke, Sandy McCutcheon, Vanessa Bonnin

The View from Fez is an official Media Partner of the Fès Festival of World Sacred Music

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