Two Western ensembles created by two musicians originally from the Middle East: Fahmi Alqhai, who was born in Seville, but whose family is from Syria, where he lived as a child; and Kiya Tabassian, born in Iran, but who has lived in Canada since he was a teenager. They get together in a project that has already been tested with great success. Accademia del Piacere, Alqhai's ensemble, performs in a basic viola da gamba trio formation; Constantinople does it as a quartet. Early European music intersects here with Eastern traditions –Persian and Ottoman, essentially– for a journey that has the Mediterranean as the great trend that unites its shores and fosters a cultural mix without which the modern world could not be understood.
Accademia del Piacere
Fahmi Alqhai, Rami Alqhai, Johanna Rose, violas da gamba
Constantinople
Kiya Tabassian, setar and vocals
Didem Basar, kanun
Patrick Graham, Hamin Honari, percussion
Programme
Music from the Spanish Renaissance and the Persian and Ottoman empires of the 15th and 16th centuries.
Golestan
Panj-gâh pishrow / Persian anonymous (s. XVI)
Glosa sobre el canto llano Pange Lingua
Anónimo / Fahmi Alqhai
Ghome Ajam & Pir-e Mey Foroush
Pishrow Mohayer / Osul Duyek / Persian anonymous (s. XVI)
Si tus penas no pruebo y su glosa
Francisco Guerrero (1528-1599) / Fahmi Alqhai
Diferencias de Conde Claros
Luis de Narváez (c. 1500-1552)
Nikriz Pishrow
Aga Mu’men (c. 1580-1640)
Fantasia que contrahaze la harpa en la manera de Ludovico
Alonso de Mudarra (c. 1510-1580)
Romanescas
Alonso de Mudarra / Fahmi Alqhai
Buzurg
Dimitrie Cantemir (1673-1723)
Fecit potentiam & Fantasia 37
Miguel de Fuenllana (c. 1500-1579)
Fandango
Santiago de Murcia (1673-1739) / Fahmi Alqhai
Chavosh
Kiya Tabassian