The opening of the Festival of the World 's Rhythms |
|
Collection title
Today's News 16/05/2009
First broadcast date
05/16/2009
Abstract
The festival of world rhythms started with a classical music concert with the Italian artist Ennio Morricone accompanied by the philharmonic orchestra of Rome and a choir from Morocco.
Broadcaster
SNRT - AlAoula
Primary theme
Live performances
Secondary themes
- Art, Culture and Knowledge / Music and songs
Credits / Cast
- El Houari Hafid - Journalist
Map locations
- Morocco - Atlantic coast - Rabat
Context
Opening of the Rhythms of the World Festival
Y.Gastaut
This report was made for the TV newscast of the Moroccan SNRT (National Radio Broadcasting and Television Company) by journalist Hafidh El Houari and touches on the subject of the eighth edition of the Mawazine: Rhythms of the World festival held in Rabat between the 15th and 23rd of May 2009.
Held every May since 2001 by the Maroc-Cultures association, presided by Mounir el Majidi, a relative of King Mohammed VI, this international festival has the goal of helping the Moroccan public discover all sorts of international musical cultures by promoting the largest possible variety of musical styles, from traditional to modern, from secretive to popular. It hosts Moroccan and international stars, such as Stevie Wonder and Kylie Minogue that year.
Along with street performances, workshops, exhibits and roundtables, the concerts, which are sometimes free, are held in the open air, on dozens of stages in Rabat and surrounding areas like Chellah, the site of a Merinid necropolis near the Kasbah of the Udayas, the Mohammed V theater downtown, the Banini hall for traditional music, on large streets such as Fal Ouled Oumeir, the Al Massira avenue, the El Haouz avenue, the OLM Souissi stage in the upscale neighborhoods, a stronghold of international music and even the Salé beach near the Bou Regreg river which separates the two cities.
And it was on the latter stage that the Italian composer and conductor Ennio Morricone performed on May 15th, 2009 on the occasion of the opening of the festival, to a huge crowd. He directed a female opera singer and about a hundred Hungarian musicians from the Gyor Philharmonic Orchestra as well as ninety Moroccan choristers. Melding mysticism and lyricism, the performance solemnly mixes Arab and Western notes. The usually restless crowd, not very used to this type of concerts, least of all in the open air, is initially surprised then falls under the spell of the music. In this context, festival organizers and, most of all, Delegate President Aziz Seghrouchni pulled their bet off –they managed to gather different cultures around music.
Born in Rome in 1928, Ennio Morricone, who started off as a trumpet player, is extremely famous for having composed scores for about five hundred movies; his most famous work were soundtracks to Sergio Leone’s spaghetti westerns such as Fistful of Dollars in 1964, the Good, the Bad and the Ugly in 1966 and Once Upon a Time in the West in 1968. He also composed the original soundtrack of Gillo Pontecorvo’s the Battle of Algiers in 1966. Morricone also worked with great Italian filmmakers such as Pier Paolo Pasolini, Marco Bellocchio, Bernardo Bertolucci and Dario Argento. His work is eclectic as he also composed classical music, especially chamber music, and regularly conducts orchestras such as the Rome Symphonic Orchestra. When he arrived to Rabat, the maestro promoted the crossing of cultures and revealed he listened to Arabic music since he was a child and learned much from it.
Since that edition, the festival, under the high patronage of the King, is a continued success with its rich and diverse programs attracting more than a million people from all generations. Every year, during the month of May and on the occasion of the Mawazine festival, Rabat becomes a city open to the world.
Websites
Website of the Mawazine Festival: Rhythms of the World
http://www.festivalmawazine.ma/
