Metropole Orkest & Soloists of the Syrian Big Band

Two years on from the Orchestra of Syrian Musicians, featuring guest musicians from Africa and Europe, the Metropole Orchestra presents another genre-defying concert with a number of soloists from the

Syrian Big Band. The idea came from Hannibal Saad, who founded this big band (Syria’s first) in 2004 and has been the driving force behind the Dutch festival Oriental Landscapes since last year. With this concert he wants to showcase the diversity of musical styles originating in his home country. Most of the music comes from the area between the Tigris and Euphrates, known in Arabic as ‘the island, al-Jazira. For centuries, this area has been a patchwork of cultures and peoples: Anatolian tribes, Arabs, Armenians, Syriac Christians, Bedouins, Kurds, Turks and Yezidis. Apart from living alongside each other, these groups have also influenced each other. A number of the songs featured in the concert are found in the repertoire of various Cultures. One example is the opening song Allala, an ode to the moon that possibly dates from the time before the rise of Christianity and Islam and which is heard all across the Middle East.

The pieces selected are far removed from the solemn, traditional repertoire of ensembles such as Al-Kindi and the Syrian National Orchestra for Arabic Music. In this concert there is a greater emphasis on folk traditions and the kind of music played during festive occasions and while working the land, arranged and adapted for the Metropole Orchestra. Apart from the two orchestras, solo musicians from Syria also play an important role: mezzo soprano Dima Orsho, clarinettist Kinan Azmeh, singer Ibrahim Kevo, and Moslem Rahal on ney (a reed flute). Dutch jazz trumpeter Eric Vloeimans also features prominently.

Apart from traditional material, the concert also includes new compositions. Dutch-Greek composer Calliope Tsoupaki has written a double concert for Kinan Azmeh and Eric Vloeimans, who must give his trumpet the soft, melancholy timbre of an Armenian duduk. He will also perform Song for Syria, a new composition of his own. Works by Kinan Azmeh also featured, and Dima Orsho will sing her own songs Those Forgotten on the River of Euphrates, Hidwa, and Trip to Gouta. The orchestra will play one of Kareem Roustom’s festive pieces called Dabka; Dabke is a folk dance and a type line dance from the Middle East, which is typically performed at joyous occasions. “The idea is to give the audience a glimpse of Syria’s musical riches”, Hannibal Saad explains. “And of what Syria might sound like if there wasn’t a war on.”