CANCELLED: Afghanistan: Safar Ensemble

Afghanistan is one of the most exciting cultural regions in the Silk Road’s extensive sphere of influence. Over the course of the country’s eventful history, Persia’s sound world has also left musical trails, as have the colours of northern India and the styles of the Arabs and the Mongols. The country has suffered greatly as a result of the political turbulence of recent decades: so we are very lucky that four great masters of classical music – in the Safar ensemble – are coming to Hamburg.

At the new Music Institute in Kabul they reconstruct lost treasures and seek to revive the capital’s golden age. At one time, the artists’ quarter of Kharabat was a hotbed of art music and Sufi traditions, and jazz and pop also held their own. The sound of Safar (»journey«) is characterised by the lute-like rubab, the bowed lute ghaychak and the string instrument dilruba.