Layale Chaker & Sarafand
presented by The Center for Middle Eastern Studies
Monday, April 24, 2023
Crowder Hall
7:30 p.m., Free Admission
Pre-Concert Talk – 6:30 p.m., Crowder Hall
A Conversation with Layale Chaker: Borders, Music, and Edward Said
Layale Chaker and Dr. Andrea Shaheen Espinosa (FFSoM DMA ’12) will discuss navigating national and musical borders, life as an Arab musician in the U.S., and the impact of Edward Said’s musical initiatives. Chaker was a longtime member of Edward Said and Daniel Barenboim’s West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, and recently debuted her composition, En Présence de l’Absence, an homage to Said and his work as a scholar, activist, and musician. The conversation will also feature selections of recorded performances of En Présence de l’Absence and other works by Chaker.
Lebanese-Palestinian violinist and composer Layale Chaker, a member of the Silkroad Ensemble, was raised on the verge of several musical streams since her childhood. She debuted her musical training at the National Higher Conservatory of Beirut and later went on to pursue studies at Conservatoire Regional de Paris and the Royal Academy of Music in London.
Layale’s musical world lies at the intersection of classical contemporary music, Jazz, Arabic Music, and improvisation. She has received commissions and presented performances and projects around Europe, the Middle-East, North and South America and Asia, and has collaborated with Daniel Barenboim and the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, Ziad Rahbani, Johnny Gandelsman, Holland Baroque, International Contemporary Ensemble, Oxford Orchestra, the New World Symphony, Babylon Orchestra, performing at the London Jazz Festival, Alderburgh Festival, Junger Kunstler Festival Bayreuth, the Lucerne Festival for Contemporary Music, Impuls’ Festival, Beethoven Festival Bonn and Avignon Festival among others, and concert halls such as The Berlin Philharmonic, Abbaye de Royaumont, Hancher Auditorium, The Stone, National Sawdust, the Banff Centre, the Royal Albert Hall and the Wigmore Hall.
Layale Chaker will perform with her ensemble, Sarafand: Jake Charkey (cello), Phillip Golub (piano), Sam Minaie (bass) and John Hadfield (percussion). Their debut album, “Inner Rhyme”, recipient of the AFAC 2018 fund, is dedicated to the sounds, rhythms, rhymes, shapes and forms of Arabic poetry. The album was released on In a Circle Records and listed as “Top of The World” by Songlines with a 5-star review, rated #2 on NPR 10 Best Releases, #1 for several weeks on the World Charts of iTunes and Amazon Music, and has received praises by the BBC Music Magazine, The New York Times, The Strad, Strings Magazine, Jazz World among others.
A 2020-2022 Jerome Hill Fellow and winner of the Silkroad Seeds inaugural 2020 award, Layale is also recipient of the Opera America Dicovery 2022 award, a Nadia et Lili Boulanger 2019 laureate, finalist of the Rolex Mentor & Protege 2018 Prize, the recipient of the Diaphonique Franco-British Commission Prize 2019, the 2018 Arab Fund for Arts and Culture Grant, the Royal Academy of Music 2018 Guinness Award, and the winner of the Ruth Anderson 2017 Competition.
