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Scroll down to read or go directly to: 6th Annual Tamburitza Festival Attracts Capacity Crowds Oakland Elementary Students Embrace Brazilian Capoeira Advocacy ACTION ALERT! SUPPORT AB 655!! Fund California’s Art and Culture!
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WHAT'S NEWSubscribe to The New Moon, ACTA's Monthly E-Newsletter. See the latest edition of The New Moon 20th Annual Jewish Music Festival Explores Iraqi-Jewish Traditional Music Through Artist’s Residency
Yair Dalal teaches students at Cole Middle School in Oakland. Photo by Mari Pongkhamsing Article by Mari Pongkhamsing, ACTA When Yair Dalal visited Cole Middle School in Oakland he met a group of students largely unfamiliar with the music and cultural traditions of the Middle East. But as soon as he began to perform on the violin the lively chatter in the room ceased and the audience began to clap their hands and stamp their feet in appreciation. He invited the children to play with him and in response an enthusiastic group joined him on stage, pulling their violins from their cases. During the month of February, Dalal, an Israeli of Iraqi Jewish heritage, offered a series of such workshops in Bay Area schools, universities, and community arts centers. The Berkeley Richmond Jewish Community Center’s 20th Annual Jewish Music Festival hosted Dalal as an artist-in-residence supported by ACTA’s Folk and Traditional Arts Mentorship Initiative with funding from the Walter & Elise Haas Fund. The festival organizers seek to introduce Bay Area audiences to Middle Eastern Jewish music and bring awareness of the Jewish historical experience in the Middle East at a time when greater understanding of this region is crucial. A peace activist, Dalal works to bring Arabs and Jews together through music and he has dedicated himself to reviving the traditional music of Iraq. In the first half of the twentieth century Jews comprised the majority of Iraqi instrumentalists. They performed in the official ensemble of Iraq Radio and as entertainers in Baghdad nightclubs. The Jewish population of Iraq, had lived continuously in the region for more than 2,000 years, but during the fight for Israel, they faced anti-Jewish rioting. In 1950 Jews were allowed to leave the country or face economic restrictions. Most of the Iraqi Jewish population, about one hundred and twenty five thousand people, left by 1951. The Iraqi Jewish musicians who immigrated to Israel continued to perform, forming the Israel Radio Arab Orchestra. Yair Dalal studied with these musicians in an effort to preserve Iraqi Jewish music for the next generation. Dalal has introduced new audiences to this music through worldwide performances, workshops, commercial recordings, collaboration on a documentary entitled “Baghdad Bandstand,” and his school for traditional Judeo-Arabic Music in Jaffa, Israel. His has received international acclaim, performing at the Nobel Peace Prize Gala Concert in Oslo, Norway in 1994. In 2002 the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) nominated him as “the best musician from the Middle East.” Yair Dalal will perform this month with the 20th Annual Jewish Music Festival. 6th Annual Tamburitza Festival Attracts Capacity Crowds
Westwind International Dance Ensemble performs at the Photo by Mari Pongkhamsing Article by Mari Pongkhamsing, ACTA On February 18th and 20th the Slavonic Cultural Center, celebrated the most popular Croatian folk music instrument at the 6th Annual Tamburitza Festival. The tamburitza, originally brought to the Balkan peninsula by the Turks, is a long-necked string instrument that takes many forms, from the tiny three-stringed bisernica to the giant bass-like berde. Though closely associated with Croatian folk music, Hungarians, Czechs and some Germans also adopted Tamburitza music, and the Roma were the principal professional players. Tamburitza music also spread among Slavic immigrants in the United States, becoming firmly established in American Slavic communities by the 1920s. Audiences at the Tamburitza Festival were treated to the music of these varied communities. The festival finale featured a lively dance folk performance followed by a community dance party. The event was so popular that when tickets sold out, guests gathered outside the building to watch performances through the windows.
John Daley (center), Director of the Croatian American Cultural Center, performs Photo by Mari Pongkhamsing The Slavonic Cultural Center, which recently rededicated it’s building as the Croatian American Cultural Center, presents a series of music and dance concerts and four popular festivals each year. The Center is a recipient of ACTA’s Folk and Traditional Arts Mentorship grant, funded by the Walter & Elise Haas Fund. Through an organizational mentorship, the Center staff will work with Alma Plancich and Maria Kesovija, directors of the Ethnic Heritage Council in Seattle to develop an artistic program development plan which will give the staff a strategic tool to use for organizing each of their festivals. Working with these mentors will also help them to develop new outreach strategies to attract new audiences and implement plans for augmenting the use of contextual materials such as historical photographs and oral histories in their programming. The Croatian American Cultural Center/Slavonic Cultural Center will present several programs in March and April. Visit the Center's website for more information. Oakland Elementary Students Embrace
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