David Dalle
Thursday August 1st, 2019 with David Dalle
Guests Kinan Azmeh and Maryem Tollar join me to discuss their music and appearances at the Ottawa Chamber Music Festival!

Today I am joined by Kinan Azmeh, who writes he would "like to be described as a Syrian-born, New York-based, genre-bending clarinetist and composer". Azmeh has music degrees from the Damascus High Institute of Music and Juillard in New York. His international life as an extremely successful Syrian expatriate musician became one of a Syrian exile after Syria was plunged into civil war. His music can be both global in scope with his membership in Yo Yo Ma's Silk Road Ensemble and his many collaborations with musicians from all over the world, and can be intensely focused on the agonies and sorrows of his home and also his longing for home. The Syrian civil war has changed his perspective "The art I do doesn't stop a bullet, doesn't bring a free democratic secular Syria, it doesn't bring back people who died... (but) it gives us a reason to live." Kinan Azmeh will be joined by his longtime collaborator pianist Dinuk Wijeratne and the Quator Danel tonight at Dominion Chalmers in what promises to be a true highlight of the festival! http://www.chamberfest.com/concerts/2019-0801-03/ You can still listen to Kinan in his searing lament for home on-demand from 2017: https://cod.ckcufm.com/programs/105/33418.html Canada's celebrated Arabic vocalist Maryem Tollar will also be joining me to discuss her Al Qahwa ensemble and their new album "Cairo Moon", a love letter to Cairo. They are playing at the festival Monday night. http://www.chamberfest.com/concerts/2019-0805-07/