Kurdish Music video, Stran, Turks, Alisan, Abdulqahar Zaxoli, Islam Zaxoli, Haval Ibrahim, Karwan Kamil, Halbin, Zaxo, Duhok, Kurd, Zaxokadelal

Author: Halbin0 Keywords: Hejar Muhemd Eli Nerweyi Hewler Kurdish Music video Stran Turks Alisan Abdulqahar Zaxoli Islam Haval Ibrahim Karwan Kamil Halbin Zaxo Duhok Kurd Zaxokadelal Added: December 2, 2008

divimg alt="" src="http://hits.guardian.co.uk/b/ss/guardiangu-feeds/1/H.15.1/33226?ns=guardianpageName=Music%3A+Bold+as+brassch=Musicc3=The+Guardianc4=Classical+music+and+opera%2CMusic%2CCulture+sectionc5=Classical+Music%2CNot+commercially+usefulc6=Tom+Servicec7=2008_12_02c8=1127264c9=articlec10=GUc11=Musicc12=Classical+music+and+operac13=c14=h2=GU%2FMusic%2FClassical+music+and+opera" width="1" height="1" //divpFortieth birthdays are always hard. Are you 40 years young, or getting long in the tooth? When the London Sinfonietta started out in 1968, it was the only ensemble of its kind anywhere in the world: a place where young composers could hear their music played alongside modernist greats. The group's first-ever programme, in January 1968, looks bizarre to anyone who has been to a Sinfonietta gig in the past decade or so: music by Hans Werner Henze, the world premiere of John Tavener's The Whale, Richard Strauss's conservative and inoffensive Symphony for Wind. These days, the Sinfonietta wouldn't touch Richard Strauss with a bargepole. A concert at the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London tonight shows how far they have come: contemporary classics from Harrison Birtwistle and John Adams, alongside eight first performances./ppThe Sinfonietta was dreamed up by a group of twentysomething young turks - conductor David Atherton, impresarios Nicholas Snowman and Andrew Rosner - and quickly became an essential part of Britain's musical landscape. By 1973, Karlheinz Stockhausen was praising its unique commitment to music-making, and Pierre Boulez was performing his Domaines with the ensemble around Europe. "It was technically incredibly hard," says David Purser, a Sinfonietta trombonist for more than 34 years. "One simply hadn't thought of playing music that difficult. There's a real excitement in that challenge from a player's point of view, and in working with the giants of the 20th century." Xenakis, Carter, Ligeti, Berio, Lachenmann, Reich, Adams: the Sinfonietta's collaborators form a roll call of 20th- and 21st-century musical history./ppBut it is a commitment to British composers that runs like a golden thread through the Sinfonietta's story. Tonight's concert starts with Birtwistle, who first wrote for the group in 1969. Sinfonietta pianist Nicolas Hodges, who had a career-defining moment performing the world premiere of Carter's Dialogues four years ago, has fond memories of the concerts of the late 1980s, when "everything I went to was [performed by] the London Sinfonietta". But he sees the downside to this hegemony of new music. "Looking back, there were relatively few British composers the Sinfonietta promoted heavily. It was basically a bastion of the worst things about the clubs and cliques of British new music. In that time, they would shudder at performing Brian Ferneyhough or Michael Finnissy" - both composers whose complexity puts special demands on their performers. "But," Hodges adds, "it's testament to how the ensemble has developed in the past decade that they have now been included on their programmes."/ppThe people who set the Sinfonietta on that course were Oliver Knussen, music director from 1998 to 2002, and Gillian Moore, artistic director from 1998 to 2006. Knussen showcased a new range of international names and styles, but there were also cross-genre collaborations: dance from Akram Khan, live visuals from Peter Greenaway, and a partnership with the avant-garde electronica of Warp Records. /ppMoore says she was consciously trying to put new classical music at the heart of broader contemporary culture: "The reason for working with Warp and Radiohead" - the Sinfonietta regularly performs music by Radiohead guitarist Jonny Greenwood - "wasn't to create crossover, but rather to acknowledge connections between classical and other types of practice."/ppHer strategy has worked. The two Warp concerts at the Festival Hall, which have since toured the world, brought full houses and a new, younger audience. The Sinfonietta packed the place out again this season for a concert of Thomas Adegrave;s and Steve Reich. David Purser says the Warp events were the moment when the Sinfonietta broke out of its new-music ghetto: "We got through to people who are interested in contemporary culture, theatre and art, but who hadn't previously come to contemporary music. Gone are the days - mercifully - when you could shake hands with everyone in the audience because they'd been coming to all the concerts of the past 10 years." /ppNot everyone is so enthusiastic. While Hodges praises the ensemble's internationalism, he thinks that "they have also taken on projects and music of dubious quality - which presumably make them a lot of friends and a lot of money, but ultimately are artistically thin". Andrew Burke, the current artistic director, defends this kind of programming: "We have a responsibility to seek out new ways of engaging audiences, whether that's through other art forms or through technology. We have to be part of the digital chatter of people's lives." /ppBurke doesn't want to lose sight of what is at the core of the Sinfonietta's work: giving world-class concerts of music you can't hear anywhere else in the UK. "In a sense, we're a niche of a niche; not just 'classical' but 'contemporary classical'. Yes, this music is often more complex - and I don't think we should be scared of that word - and more deep, more challenging than other areas of music. But when you get into it, my God, the payback! We have a responsibility to take that message out, with religious zeal."/pp· The strongLondon Sinfonietta/strong's 40th birthday concert is at the Queen Elizabeth Hall, London SE1 (0871 663 2500), tonight. There will also be a special celebration at the Royal Festival Hall, London SE1, on December 13. 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