The shy Palestinian teenager raised her flute and dispatched the courtly melodies and cascading runs of an 18th-century concerto with surprising self-assurance.Over just three years of study the flute had become a near obsession for Dalia Moukarker, 16. She was practicing so hard …. For she has earned an almost surreal reward: a master class with her hero, Emmanuel Pahud, a major international soloist.
Dalia is one of a new generation of Palestinians who have been swept up in a rising tide of interest in Western classical music in the last several years here in the Palestinian territories, but especially the West Bank. The sounds of trills and arpeggios, Bach minuets and Beethoven sonatas, are rising up amid the economic malaise and restrictions of the Israeli occupation.
Mr. Pahud circled, studying her intently. Then he took her instrument and sent out stunning roulades of notes to demonstrate. Dalia gaped in wonder and gave a soft laugh of amazement.
The flute, she said later, “takes me to another world that is far away from here, a more beautiful world. Because it is not a beautiful place here. It is an ugly place.”
Read the whole story at:
Daniel J Wakin, Minuets, Sonatas and Politics in the West Bank, New York Times, 31 May 2009.
Dr Geoff Pound
Image: “The flute, Dalia Moukarker said later, ‘takes me to another world that is far away from here, a more beautiful world.’”
