Ghalia Benali / Constantinople

Ensemble Constantinople is named after the ancient city on the Bosporus that connects East and West. As an ensemble too, Constantinople creates a bridge between multiple musical roads: from medieval manuscripts to baroque music, from the Mediterranean sea to the Near East. Artistic director Kiya Tabassian was born in Iran and came into contact with the refined and profound poetry of Rumi as a child. He had long been nurturing the idea of setting poems by Rumi to music. He finally found the perfect embodiment in the voice of Ghalia Benali. Together they made a selection not only of the poems in Persian, but also of lesser-known texts in Arabic. Rumi refused to be linked to a specific nation. He wrote that he hailed from neither the West or the East. The musicians of Constantinople and Ghalia Benali present a delectable evening of profound and refined music, in the footsteps of Rumi.