 Sacred in Fez
Drenched in exoticism
and orientalism par excellence
Written and photographed by Shahrbanou
Tadjbakhsh
July 16, 2003
The Iranian
Fez. Morocco. Fez fez fes fess. Fes Fes Festival.
Festival of Sacred Music. Sacred. Sacred sacré. Sacré sacré.
If not musique sacrée, at least sacrée musique. Sacrée
moqadas. Moqadas. Moqadas. Moqadas mystic. Mystic Sufi.
Ah!
Sufi. We know Sufi. We know Sufi music, we know Sufi food, we know
Sufi
clothes. We know Sufi attitude. There is a demand for it in this
hyper-tensioned globalized world. We buy Sufi from Amazon.com.
We jam stage performances of the Mevlevi Whirling Dervishes.
We
come
with our Hugo Boss and Prada suits to the Asia Society in New York,
we turn off our cellphones and watch the dervishes whirl in
monotony. $75 khalseh. In the summer, we put on our baba-coul shirts,
sandals
and big straw hats and go to Fez, Morocco, to the World
Sacred Music Festival, for more authentic whirling.
$1,500 Khalseh. We, the Urban Sufis, We need rapture.
On the menu for our exalting pleasure this year
at the 9th festival are three windows: afternoon incantations under
a majestic oak
tree in the Bathaa Museum, evening concerts in the open air fortress
of Bab El Makina and late night "soirée soufi" where
we bridge the day into the next with different Moroccan Sufi Tariqas.
The kinds that recite their Zikr in public and let us twirl our
tresses.
We affix the adjective Sufi to everything and we
drop in on a familiar word: the electric guitar of Gilberto Gil,
a stunning
mirror dance of the Odissi tradition performed by the Indian Madhavi
Mudgal, opera by Julia Migenese, forceful drumming by the Senegalese
Doudou N'Diaye Rose with two dozen of his 42 children, Gospel by
the Anointed Jackson Sisters (transformed into a rock concert by
the itsy
bitsy-clad dancing Fez teens packing the venue) and even
political correctness with the Iraqi Farida and the Maqam Ensemble.
We venture into the glory of Islamic chants with
some
genuine whirling by the Syrian Sheikh Habbush and the Al Kindi
Ensemble, some serious
percussions and vocals by the Moroccan women's Ensemble
of Taroudant, and the names of Allah sung by the Moroccan Abdelhadi
Belkhayat and the Egyptian Said Hafid both accompanied by 50 strong
orchestras, complete with electric guitar, synthesizers, oud, violins,
a women's choir and the inevitable mini dervishes sharing
the stage.
We are even introduced to the Ilyas
Malayev Sheshmaqam
group, the Bukharan jews who emigrated to Queens decade(s) ago,
as the "ancient Judeo-Islamic tradition of Central Asia",
who sing for us the crème de la crème of mysticism:
Ei dokhtareh bi faranji (veil), ye gap begam naranji... Ei
dokhtarakAneh TAjik, gol dar boustAneh TAjik.. with an Indian rendition:
Rouham ei kojA miravi, on ghadar bA nAz miravi, to del o jAneh
mani, jAn o jAnAneh mani...
We float in inter-religious global musical mystical
ecstasy, our senses
threatening overdose from the sounds of the
concerts and
those of life being lived in the crowded Medina, hammers on artisans'
trays, water crashing in fountains, donkeys galloping in narrow
alleys,
children and more children, the smells of incense and feet and
food and rose water and orange peels and colors of tiles, colors
of saffron and salmon and indigo and azure. Drenched in exoticism
and orientalism par excellence, we are having a Sufi experience.
Ah, but then, there is Shajarian
father & Son, Alizadeh and
Kalhor this year on the menu. The
Great Masters of Classical Persian Music.
Sacred sacré. Sacré tradition. Tradition classic.
Classic Sufi? Ah! Persian Sufi! Mystical tradition. Mystic Islam.
Dozens of journalists ask: Mr. Shajarian, what is
the influence of Arabo-Islamic tradition on your music? Mr. Kalhor,
do the youth
of Iran attend your Sufi performances openly or in clandestine?
Mr. Alizadeh, how does it feel to play in Fez, the ancient seat
of Islamic tradition, in between the sound of the muezzin coming
from the 8th century Medina?
June 9th, the day of the concert.
Curiosity in Fez among the Moroccans and the mostly French culto-tourists:
What is the Persian version
of Islamic chants? Sacred sacré, sacrée musique,
musique sacrée, musique soufie, Islamic Republic of Iran
Sacré, sufi, tradition. Allahu Akbar. Yahu Ali Madad sacré.
We want exaltation, grand dafs, shaman drumming, crescendo, dum
dum swiff swiff, dum dum swiff. Dum dum swiff swiff,
dum dum swiff....
Quietly, calmly, the four enter the stage in dark
outfit and sit four-legged on the carpet. Alizadeh's
tar dribbles
a salute
like moving water. Kalhor's kamancheh cuts the path then
flows down parallel, the tempo urged steadily by Homayooun's
tombak. And then, serenely, gradually, taknavazi and hamnavazi
by the Shajarian father and son, bridging the equity gap between
very deep and deep: saman bouyAn ghobAr-eh gham cho benshinand,
benshAnand; pari ruyAn gharAr az del cho bestizand, bestAnand...
The group had chosen a repertoire in the rast panjgah,
shur, abu ata
and homayoun modes, ending in rast panjgah. Poems by Hafez, Saadi,
Qajar period Ghorrat'ol Ein and a very lyrical Shafii Kadkani.
Two compositions by each of the Masters Alizadeh and Kalhor, and
a Soal va Javab improvisation by the two.
A shorter version of
what was recorded in their 2002 Los Angeles Tour as the CD
FaryAd,
but to a large audience mostly without prior knowledge of classical
Persian music, certainly without the benefit of understanding the
classical poems in Farsi. And, yet, 2,993 non-Iranians became accomplice
to the Masters on stage, for this was a musical tradition learned
from chest to chest, transmitted soul to soul, and dedicated from
heart to heart from performer to his listener and back again. Gradually,
simplicity calmed the nerves. Gradually, purity was born. Gradually,
the Instant was improvised and then immortalized.
The Shajarians' velvet voices soared the words,
the KalAm, and put them up on the sacred pedestal, while the winged
Kamancheh
and Tar kept them floating where they belonged, on top of the Bab
El Makina open air fortress, up on top of the Fez Medina, up on
top of the World Sacred Music Festival, up on top of this hyper-tensioned
globalized world. A smooth ascend, gradual, linear, safe, pure,
cerebral, emotional and physical.
Instead of instant-mix exhaltation,
slow simmering Love in creation. Love. Love. Sacred Love, love
of the sacré. Musique sacrée, amour sacré.
Eshq, eshq, eshq. Religion of love. Then, an unexpected foroud
brought
the audience to its feet. Dream interrupted. Coitus Interruptus.
We could have easily died while reaching perfection.
Excuse me sir, but, We, the Urban Sufis, are now
confused as to whether what we heard was the end or the means for
devotion. We
still don't understand what took us up there that night without
the grand dafs, the Ya Ali Madads and whirling Iranians: the words
or the melody, sAz yA AvAz, the vocals or the words, the lyric
of the language, the meaning of the poems of Hafez and Saadi, those
pieces of wood with strings, our predisposition for flight, or
our love for God, whose name was not even mentioned but evoked,
and Its creations celebrated, that night, June 9th, 2003, in Fez,
Morocco. Le mystère sacré, un sacré mystère.
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