The chamber-music series known heretofore as Alla turca is experiencing an expansion and acquiring a new face: publicist and moderator Roger Willemsen joins the Berliner Philharmoniker from the 2011/2012 season for the world-music concerts now called Unterwegs – Underway. In a total of four programmes, he will transport his listeners to musically unfamiliar but remarkable and fascinating regions.
What does the music of the world’s “transients” sound like, how does it develop in the course of their wanderings, what unifies and what distinguishes the musical world of the nomads? Willemsen will be addressing these questions in the series’ first concert as he visits the Mongolian steppes and West African Sahara, encountering the overtone singers Huun Huur Tur from the Russian republic of Tuva and the Touareg band Tamikrest from Mali.
Spiritual, contemplative and ritualistic music will characterize the second concert, with music from monasteries in Armenia, Bulgaria and Tibet. Tibetan chant and ritual music from the monks of Tashi Lhunpo will be juxtaposed with traditional sacred Sharakan from Armenia and Orthodox chant from Bulgaria.
For the third concert we will visit Afghanistan, where war has also taken its toll on musical life: music and documents have been destroyed, the country’s strong musical tradition can hardly be kept going, the musicians’ quarter of Kabul is in ruins, and the building of instruments has stagnated. Roger Willemsen will be looking for traces of tradition in a country that, in spite of all, is still full of music. A musical and literary journey to the people, history and sounds of Afghanistan.
The fourth and last concert of the season demonstrates conclusively that the most diverse world musics have reached Berlin: musicians from Iran, China, India, North Africa and elsewhere will introduce their musical traditions to one another, then together with members of the Berliner Philharmoniker they will develop music for an inter-cultural Berlin chamber orchestra.
Coinciding with the fourth concert in the series Underway, the Education programme is organizing two workshops designated Encounters (Begegnungen) – A cultural dialogue. In these workshops the singer Amelia Cuni will offer an introduction to the melodic and rhythmic structures of Indian music, to the vocal art of dhrupad, and to Indian philosophy. These workshops are ideally suited to families as well as to singers and musicians.
