In the Name of Roots

Jean-Baptiste Lully, Jean-Pierre Guignon, Johann Sebastian Bach, Henry Purcell, Jean-Philippe Rameau, Pierre Thiloy, Astor Piazzolla, Ignaz Franz Biber, Kinan Azmeh, Darius Mihaud, Béla Kovács, Ernest Bloch

What do our roots mean to us? They can tell us about our origins, our identity; we can explore them and be proud of them. But what happens when our roots are misused and weaponised as an argument against others, against those who do not share the same roots with us?

Reflecting on the present concert, Mate Bekavac wrote: “The concert entitled In the Name of Roots offers an opportunity to experience human emotions in the noblest form, bypassing the intellect, directly ‘into the veins’, from soul to soul so to speak, without the intervention of the brain. This is a concert for courageous listeners, for those who dare to give free rein to tears, who are not ashamed to fell emotions, and who are not afraid that this will convey them to the core of the deepest human feelings, which are nowadays only experienced by those who have lost everything. No screen is able to convey the pain of losing one’s freedom, one’s loved ones, one’s homeland, the basic conditions for one’s survival.

Thanks to music and good performers, we can relive the most authentic, pure and raw emotions, and feel empathy towards others more easily. Let’s put aside pretences, diplomacy, self-interest and masks; let’s become more human and truly compassionate, at least for a moment.

And what does tango have to do with any of this? Many things. Come and let yourself go!”