I know. All we need now is for one side of the thread to be massively overfunded by the US.
All we need are more people like Daniel Barenboim.
Daniel Barenboim: My orchestra is a political laboratory
As Daniel Barenboim brings his West-Eastern Divan Orchestra to the Proms, he talks to Ivan Hewett about the problems of the Middle East
By Ivan Hewett
9:30AM BST 20 Aug 2014
The Middle East is in flames, and untold thousands have been killed or maimed or displaced. And at its epicentre, the intractable conflict between Israel and the Palestinians goes on. Until the recent ceasefire they were locked in a situation of undeclared war which has left more than 2,000 dead.
In the midst of all this, to have something appear at the Proms that’s been dubbed “An Orchestra for Peace” seems almost laughably naive. But Daniel Barenboim, who co-founded the orchestra in question, the West-Eastern Divan orchestra, denies that was ever the intention.
“It’s not an orchestra for peace in that region, because peace requires that the needs of both sides for justice and security are met. Playing Mozart and Wagner cannot give this.”
So what exactly is the point of this orchestra, which brings musicians from Israel together with musicians from Palestine, Egypt, Syria, Turkey, and the other Arab countries that many Israelis hate and fear?
“It sprang out of my belief that there can never be a military solution to this conflict,” says Barenboim. We’re meeting at the Lucerne Concert Hall, where the Divan orchestra is about to give two concerts as part of the Lucerne Summer Festival. Barenboim flew here the day before with the orchestra from Buenos Aires, where they now have their own summer festival, and he’s just emerged from a rehearsal. He seems, unsurprisingly, a little frayed around the edges.
Yet the minute this subject is raised he’s as focused as a laser beam. “This conflict is not like those normal ones between two nations that argue about borders or water or petrol, which they would eventually resolve militarily or politically,” he continues. “Here we have two nations who are absolutely convinced they have equal claims to live on the same little patch of earth, preferably without the other. There are many aspects of this conflict that are asymmetrical, not least the fact that Israel has been an occupying power for 47 years. But in this respect, they are exactly symmetrical, and each side needs to accept the impossibility of their dream.”
In the midst of all this, the Divan offers a little ray of hope. “This orchestra is like a laboratory, an experiment in two peoples living together in proximity. They are here to do things: make music and learn about the other. This can happen because the orchestra provides something that does not exist on the ground, and that is equality. When we went up on the stage last night to play Act 2 of Wagner’s Tristan, we were all equal. This is the first condition for dialogue.”
Barenboim can now look back on 15 years of achievement with the Divan orchestra, which he co-founded with the Palestinian literary critic Edward Said. What pleases him most?
“The incredible rise in playing standards. You have to remember when we started, 60 per cent of the members had never played in an orchestra, and many of them had never actually seen an orchestra live. And only eight years later we played one of the hardest pieces in the repertoire, Schoenberg’s Orchestral Variations, at the Salzburg Festival. This I would never have believed.”
Barenboim is full of the phrase for the government of Andalusia, which provides scholarships for young players from the Divan. “This is what makes us different to other youth orchestras, which only meet in the summer and then disperse,” he says. “A core of players from the Divan continue the work we do in the summer, by coming to Berlin to learn from my players in the Staatskapelle orchestra in Berlin. They return to the Divan the following summer and help the others. It creates a rising spiral of development.”
It’s only when we turn to the situation in the wider world that Barenboim’s amazing resilience flags for a moment. “It is so depressing that each side only thinks about winning this present conflict,” he says. “No one is thinking about tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow.”
But this only makes him more determined than ever to win the next battle for the orchestra. “I think the orchestra will reach its fullest flowering on the human level only when it can play in all the countries that are represented in the orchestra. In Lebanon this is now out of the question, and in Syria, and Egypt, and Palestine. And let’s not even mention Iran, where four of our players come from. This really disturbs me, and I will never give up on my efforts to make this happen.”
He admits this is going to be an uphill struggle. “Many people absolutely hate us, in the various countries where our players come from. They think we are traitors to our own people,” says Barenboim drily. “But we have just as many passionate supporters in those countries, so I think we must be doing something right.”
Daniel Barenboim and the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra appear in the BBC Prom on Aug 20 at the Royal Albert Hall http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/music/proms/11043891/Daniel-Barenboim-My-orchestra-is-a-political-laboratory.htmlPlease let's all watch this tonight!