‘Nowrouz in the company of Bach & Rumi’

Rise, Nowrouz, the new day
Nowrouz, the "new day", is the most important celebration in Iranian-Persian culture. Celebrated with the spring equinox, this thousand-year-old tradition of Zoroastrian origin honours the start of a new year. 
It transcends ethnic and religious particularities, as its message is universal: more than 90 countries recognise and practise it. It is a celebration of renewal, the victory of light over darkness, and a symbol of peace and solidarity.
The show "Rise, oh day" accompanies these moments of sharing. A transcultural concert, it features two figures who dedicated their lives to the renewal of spiritual light and the illumination of the soul, exalting the connection with transcendence in each of their works.
In a few words
"Rise, oh day" is a conversation in music and poetry to mark the celebrations of Nowrouz, the passage from winter to spring. 
It is the fictional conversation between composer Johann Sebastian Bach and the Persian mystic and poet Djalâl ad-Dîn Rumî, also known as Mowlana. 
It is an encounter between four artists at the crossroads of the European and Persian worlds: Leili Anvar (readings, recitations), Layla Ramezan (piano), Camille Bordet (vocals) and Milad Mohammadi (tar, setar, oud and tombak). 
It is the creation of a unique language, combining baroque music, Persian music, improvisation and declamation.
The show
A night in the theater - a voice rises. A voice like a thread that slowly weaves syllables, words, phrases that become poems; it is one then two voices, it speaks or sings or plays in the strings of the tar, the oud and the piano. A thread that links times and places. It invites two geniuses, living 500 years and 3000 km apart, but sharing the same love of the divine and the same need to express it through art: Djalal ad-Din Rumi, known to Iranians as Mowlana (1207 - 1273) and Johann Sebastian Bach (1685 - 1750).
A meeting, long after their deaths: if, by the force of their metaphors, Rumi and Bach were to enter into a dialogue, what would they have to say to each other? What would they confide in each other about their relationship to God, existence and its end, the human condition, poetry and beauty? How would their thinking develop through contact with others?
In a world where otherness is often presented as a threat, it is possible, on the contrary, to see its richness. There is a path where we can open up to the unknown with kindness and curiosity and initiate an exchange where each person decides to accept, respect, and even cherish what is in order to grow through the discovery of others.
This is the approach proposed by the four artists. Their stories are singular: from different generations, shaped by several cultures, they have a personal relationship with spirituality, texts, music and the stage. Their universes inspire each other and build a borderless journey, where past and present meet, where the dead dream with the living. 
Pieces with multiple levels of interpretation respond to each other: extracts from the dance suites written by Bach dialogue with the ecstatic poems that Rumi declaimed as he spun around; the perpetual motion of the prelude in C minor is mirrored by the "dance of atoms"; one awaits the Beloved, the other the Redeemer, both rejoice in death, which they perceive as a birth? Both use their art to express the unspeakable. 
Poems, cantatas, solo pieces and improvised musical dialogues, all echoes of their exchanges, create a common language: a language of harmony and beauty.
"Rise, oh day" is a show created in 2024 by the company "La voie d'Azim", and produced by Dr. Zahedi Vafa and the Company GMS.
 

Leili Anvar, stories
Layla Ramezan, piano
Camille Bordet, vocal
Milad Mohammadi, tar, oud, tombak