A busy week for the “Abu Dhabi Festival”: piano, violin and “Buddha” come with pearls!
Tenor Juan Diego Florez opened his twentieth session
Thursday – 24 Shaaban 1444 AH – March 16, 2023 AD
Sheikh Nahyan bin Mubarak Al Nahyan and Huda Al-Khamis honor international tenor Juan Diego Florez
Abu Dhabi: «Asharq Al-Awsat»
The twentieth session of the “Abu Dhabi Festival”, organized by the “Abu Dhabi Group for Culture and Arts”, was launched under the slogan “The will to develop, the yearning for leadership.”
and tonight (Thursday), Chinese pianist Zhang Huoxin will perform at the Blue Room at The Arts Center (NYU Abu Dhabi); He performs a group of the most prominent pieces of Beethoven.
The festival will present “From West to East: A Classic Odyssey” for the first time in the Middle East tomorrow (Friday); Composer Tan Dun conducts the orchestra of the Teatro Comunale di Modena Pavarotti-Frini, accompanied by Jian Wang, the famous Chinese cellist. The evening includes the most prominent classics of Mozart, Tchaikovsky, and Mussorgsky, followed by the first performance of his original piece, “Concerto Pippa”, in the Emirates.
Don, who won two Grammy and Oscar awards, through his opera “Passion of the Buddha”, celebrates the aesthetics of classical music and the eastern and western musical traditions, and presents in 95 minutes a collection of stories and proverbs from the legacy of Buddha, in which he traces his journey to reach the state of “nirvana”. With his work, he sheds light on the ancient accounts of the Buddha’s teachings and common human concepts and values such as love, tolerance and sacrifice.
The festival also allows its guests to visit the Cultural Foundation on Saturday, March 19, to watch the show “The Pearl Fisherman’s Daughter”, which combines music, performance and advanced technology, to provide an adventure that attracts all ages to embark on a journey of exploration of the Emirati cultural heritage.
This work is the result of collaboration between Emirati writer Maitha Al Khayyat and Emirati composer Iman Al Hashemi with the American dance company Company E. It offers an experience supported by augmented reality that tells stories regarding family, the past, and the aesthetics of heritage, through diving trips in the Gulf and searching for pearls.
The events will end on Monday, March 20, with the 16-year-old British-Chinese violinist Lia Zhou, accompanied by the Swiss concert pianist Benjamin Ingli, on a journey with a collection of pieces by Mozart, Strauss, Debussy, Vinniewski and Sarasate; This is in the Blue Room at the Arts Center (NYU Abu Dhabi).
The festival was opened on the first of March with an evening presented by tenor Juan Diego Florez, who was honored by the Minister of Tolerance and Coexistence and patron of the “Abu Dhabi Group for Culture and Arts”, Sheikh Nahyan bin Mubarak Al Nahyan, with the “Abu Dhabi Festival” award presented by the festival in partnership with Chopard, in recognition of his artistic achievement. He devoted his life to teaching music.
Florez presented a group of the most famous songs, with an orchestra that includes pianists, guitar, trumpet and percussion players led by Jonathan Bolivar.
Before the show, the Abu Dhabi Group for Culture and Arts, founder and artistic director of the Abu Dhabi Festival, Hoda Ibrahim Al-Khamis, expressed her pleasure in hosting the opening evening, “one of the finest operatic voices of our time,” tenor Juan Diego Florez and his troupe, as she described it; “In confirmation of the festival’s commitment throughout its two decades, to consolidating the capital’s position as a global destination for leading international artists and creators, stimulating cultural diplomacy and building bridges of communication between the UAE and the world,” according to her welcoming speech.
For his part, Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan affirmed that the festival “opens its doors for new decades full of achievement and giving, committed to investing in the youth of the country and refining their skills in light of the values of openness, coexistence and human brotherhood, as a pillar of sustainability and a basis for development that can only be achieved by considering the human being in The core of its priorities,” stressing that “it represents, in its twentieth session, a platform for the dialogue of cultures, and a bridge connecting the East with the West, deriving its authenticity from the roots that it deeply instills in the heritage of the Emirates, working to achieve its leadership in stimulating the efforts of cultural diplomacy, as a contribution to highlighting the Emirati global presence and supporting creators in international forums.
Jazz and “From Scheherazade to Carmen”
Also among the festival’s guests is Grammy-award-winning jazz pianist Gregory Porter, who performed his first show in the UAE last Saturday, and included a collection of his original tracks from his albums “Liquid Spirit” (2013) and “Take Me for a Walk Across the Walk” (2017). ); He will perform a range of jazz classics, with Chip Crawford on piano, Emanuel Harrold on drums, Typhon Bennicott on saxophone, and Jamal Nichols on bass.
The show “From Scheherazade to Carmen”, the first in the Middle East, by Spanish flamenco performer Maria Bakhis also witnessed a remarkable presence from inside and outside the UAE. This work, created and produced by Bakhis, and co-produced by the “Abu Dhabi Festival” and the “Lecibo de Barcelona Festival”, draws dramatic inspiration from the essence of the female figures who distinguished the worlds of world culture. It is, according to a statement, “characterized by the maturity and organic connection between flamenco art and choreography, as Bakhis deepens in sympathy with women, and builds a purely feminine world as the basis for a human voice that rises to express the multifaceted reality of women, documenting her biography and defending her.”
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