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Nada Bakri reading from Shadid's memoir, with Al-Bustan's resident takht ensemble. Photo by Dana Scherer.
December 9, 2012
Al-Bustan presented a musical and literary afternoon honoring the late Anthony Shadid, sponsored by Qatar Foundation International, with co-sponsorship from UPenn’s Middle East Center and GIC. As part of Al-Bustan’s 2012-13 Arab Music Concert Series, this event remembered Shadid through his writing and with music from the region that he loved and so passionately wrote about.
Shadid was a two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning foreign correspondent for The New York Times. He died on February 16, 2012 from an acute asthma attack while covering the conflict in Syria. The event featured a performance by the Philadelphia Arab Music Ensemble and a reading by Shadid’s wife Nada Bakri to an audience of almost 200 at Trinity Center for Urban Life in Center City Philadelphia.
The afternoon opened with The Philadelphia Arab Music Ensemble led by Music Director Hanna Khoury. The Ensemble, which is offered as a course for credit through the University of Pennsylvania’s Music Department, is comprised of both Penn students and community members. They played a selection of Arab and Turkish compositions including Sama’i Garip, Ya Naseem Al-Rih (Oh Breath of the Wind), Hamilul Hawa (Carrier of Love), Ya Ghazalan (Oh beauty), Ya Man Hawa (Oh Who Embodies the Roses), and Kumsalda. Their engaging performance was a testament to the dedication of the musicians and the recent master classes with Hüsnü Şenlendirici and Karima Skalli. The last instrumental piece Longa Kurd included a percussion solo by members of the percussion ensemble led by Hafez El Ali Kotain.
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After the Ensemble finished their set, Khoury demonstrated to the audience the latest features of Al-Bustan’s Digital Education tools: Yalli Zara’tu-l Burtu’an (Those Who Planted the Oranges). This website allows anyone to learn and perform this Arabic song written by famed Egyptian composer Mohammed Abdel Wahab.
The second half of the afternoon’s event featured Al-Bustan’s resident takht ensemble playing music to complement Nada Bakri’s readings from her late husband’s memoir House of Stone. Published shortly after his death, the memoir juxtaposes past and present as he traces the house’s renewal along with his family’s flight from Lebanon and resettlement in America. Shadid captivated readers with his compelling and empathetic storytelling as a correspondent for The Washington Post and The New York Times.
Photos by Dana Scherer:
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Al-Bustan’s resident takht ensemble, comprised of Hanna Khoury on violin, Kinan Abou-afach on cello, Kinan Idnawi on oud, and Hafez El Ali Kotain on percussion, played pieces that were favorites of Shadid or complemented the text, including some of their own compositions. Bakri selected passages that illustrated Shadid’s connection to the house of his ancestors and to the culture of his homeland more generally.
Though Shadid did not grow up learning Arabic, he studied the language while a college student in Egypt. He recognized this as a key step towards realizing his ambition to become a journalist covering the Middle East. This familiarity with the language and culture gave him the ability to connect with locals and a greater understanding and appreciation for the region and its people. Anthony’s work embodies the mission of Al-Bustan where we encourage students to explore their identity and heritage by telling their stories through creative forms of expression.
Bakri began by reading excerpts in which Shadid described the pace that his ancestor’s house held in his life in contemporary Lebanon. While the 2006 war interrupted the traditions of daily life this home, which he referred to as bayt, “home” in Arabic, was somewhere to retreat from the description. It was also a reminder of past splendors, which he looked upon with “shame over what the present is.” Between excerpts, the ensemble played Petra 2, a composition by Kinan Abou-afach, evoked the afternoon’s somber mood followed by Jaw, composed by Kinan Idnawi.
While Bakri read Shadid’s description of his friendship with a neighbor which developed over discussions of “masters of Arab strings from Mohamed al-Kasabji to Abboud Abdel-Aal”, the ensemble played Zekrayati a composition by al-Kasabji.
Just as the singer in Nassam Alayna (Blowing Breeze), a composition by the Rahbani Brothers, calls on a breeze to take him home, Bakri ended her reading with Shadid imagining future generations returning to the home of his ancestors, to bayt.
See coverage of the event in an article by Michael Matza in the Philadelphia Inquirer. See overview of the next day, Nada Bakri’s visit to Northeast High School, a public school in Philadelphia.