Musicians from Beirut talk about their sonic memories from the Lebanese Civil War (1975–1990) and the 2006 war between Israel and Hizbullah.

The Weeping Willow
By Thomas Burkhalter (Norient) on August 28, 2009
By Thomas Burkhalter (Norient) and Simon Grab on 28 August 2009 in AUDIOMusicians from Beirut talk about their sonic memories from the Lebanese Civil War (1975–1990) and the 2006 war between Israel and Hizbullah.
The Weeping Willow
Posted in AUDIO | Tagged Amal, Arab World, Charbel Haber, Cyrille Najjar, Death Metal, Dossier Arab World, Garo Gdanian, Hizbullah, Israel, Lebanese Forces, Lebanon, Mazen Kerbaj, Noise, Propaganda, Raed Yassin, Sonic Memory, The Force, Trauma, Violence, War, Weeping Willow | Leave a response
Dr. Thomas Burkhalter is an ethnomusicologist, music journalist, and cultural producer from Switzerland. The founder and director of Norient, he published the book Local Music Scenes and Globalization: Transnational Platforms in Beirut (Routledge) and co-edited The Arab Avant-Garde: Music, Politics, Modernity (Wesleyan University Press), Seismographic Sounds – Visions of a New World (Norient) and Out of the Absurdity of Life – Globale Musik (Norient/Traversion). He works as a researcher and project leader at the University of Basel and the University of Arts Bern (HKB), financed by the Swiss National Foundation (SNF). As the director of the Norient Musikfilm Festival, a documentary filmmaker and audio-visual performer, he places emphasis on transdisciplinary approaches between theory and practice.
See CV, publications, films and projects: Here
The co-founder of ganzerplatz soundstudios has been an active musician and producer in a wide range of musical contexts. As a composer and sound artist he produces music & sounddesign for feature films, documentaries, theatre and radio. In live performances and installations Simon Grab uses the venue as an acoustic playground. He likes exploring new grounds by negating existing borders.
Website: ganzerplatz.ch
«Norient ist zu dem geworden, was die
Musikzeitschrift Spex in Deutschland
zeitweise einmal war: ein Thinktank,
der über den globalen Mainstream
der Minderheiten reflektiert.»
Daniel Bax, taz, 25. Mai 2013