Beneath velvet skies
Amal Choucri Catta speaks to Hassan Kami, director of this year's Citadel Summer Festival of Music and Song
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Hassan Kami:'...we have prepared a lovely theatre, the Saha, with a capacity of 1200 seats'
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Last Sunday the theatres that sit within the Citadel complex were spot-lit for the opening ceremony of the 15th Citadel Summer Festival of Music and Song, an annual event with the laudable aim of producing summer musical performances at the doorstep of the Citadel's densely populated area.
This year the festival runs from 10 to 20 August. For the past 14 years inhabitants of the area, and from further afield, have been coming in growing numbers to the festival, wandering from one theatre to the other, lingering on till the end of the last performance, enjoying the breeze, the music and the variety of programmes presented every evening from 7 to 12pm.
"Beginning last year the festival began opening its doors to international performers, something we intended to expand. Unfortunately, however, in the wake of the Iraqi war and the Middle-East situation this has proved problematic this year," says Hassan Kami, artistic adviser to Cairo's Opera House and the festival's director.
"We are, nevertheless, planning to have a large number of international features in the future. In the meantime we are inviting audiences to come and enjoy the shows, free of charge," he adds. "These shows are just a sample of what is being presented in one or the other of the Opera's theatres. At the Citadel we tend to present programmes that were tried and tested, that people want to see or listen to. So there is Oriental music and folkloric dances, with one item per day of a more demanding nature. For these shows we have prepared a lovely theatre, the Saha, with a capacity of one-thousand- two-hundred seats: it has the Mohamed Ali Mosque as backdrop, a most beautiful setting. There we are presenting different kinds of programmes, ranging from concerts by several traditional Oriental ensembles, to Palestinian, Syrian and Sudanese nights and musical performances from different Egyptian cities, starting with Marsa Matruh, Alexandria and Port-Said and going south to Nubia. There are also performances by Dr Gabry's dancing ensembles: he is presenting daily folkloric shows at the Saha III theatre, which he subsidises. There is also a fascinating small theatre, erected a few years ago for Walid Aouni's Sheherazade, and which has been reserved for performances including Sobhi Bedeir, Nevine Allouba, Raouf El-Ganainy, Yehia Khalil and others. And finally we have the Mahka Al- Qalaa, with a seating capacity of over two- thousand: here we will present musicians such as Mohamed El-Helew, Ali El-Haggar, Iman El-Bahr Darwish and the Sharara Sextet. This year, too, there will be two Indian ensembles: one for music played on Oriental instruments similar to those used in Egypt, like the oud and the Qanun, and one for dance, with -- on 19 August -- popular and folkloric dances from Indian villages. Last year we had the Filarmonica de Montevideo, a famous folklore and tango group, with an orchestra of 50 musicians. It's the first time, this year, that we open the doors to Asian companies, and we hope it will prove a promising overture to many other ventures of the same kind.
"This year we expect over 70,000 spectators: with all the ushers, the security and the necessary personnel from Cairo's Opera House at our disposal we should have no difficulty in managing this number. There will be a shuttle service taking spectators by bus from the Citadel's main entrance to the Saha every half hour. And there is a huge parking lot at the entrance where spectators can park their cars. The festival is well organised, it is entertaining and attracts an ever growing local audience as well as those who are happy to flee Cairo's scorching heat and take refuge on top of the hill."
None of which any fair-minded person would care to dispute. Yet reservations might be expressed over the massive weighting of Arabic music and folklore over other performances. Over the past decade or so the more elaborate performances that the festival sought to introduce appear to have been blown away by the Citadel winds, to be replaced by a series of ambiguous shows of so-called jazz and pop, or jazz-fusion.
"After a number of years", says Hassan Kami, "you start studying what people accept and what they reject. After all, we do want audiences to come and we don't want musicians and dancers to perform in an empty hall. We have to compromise, and I don't think that is such a bad idea. We do, however, present songs from musicals and the Euro-American repertoire, alongside performances of, say, Omar Khairat's compositions, so to some extent the festival presents musical elements that are not the kind of thing people hear every day. Certainly, the festival seeks to avoid imposing on the public. We want people to come, to spend a lovely evening and also to become acquainted with at least some of the programming at the Opera House. And even at the Opera House there is a lot more local Arabic music than used to be programmed. The current management is trying hard to pull down any psychological barriers that exist between the people in the street and the Opera House. And, sadly, I think that it is true that sometimes people are afraid to come to the Opera because they think they will find something they can't understand. When they do come they are pleasantly surprised at discovering a foreign opera with simultaneous Arabic translation, or a ballet the synopsis of which they can read in the programme. It is a gradual process, but one in which light performances at the Citadel plays an important part. Hopefully, the Citadel will intrigue the curiosity of some of the audience, and curiosity will lead them into the Opera House, and when they do wander there they will enjoy what they find. I believe this is a good way to develop interest in the Opera, which can sometimes seem too institutional."
"And it is true that jazz has become a draw with the Egyptian public and there is no reason why it should not, via some organisation, receive some form of state subsidy, however indirect. There is very little networking between the various musicians, and I for one would like to see closer ties between the various jazz ensembles and some form of recognition of what they do from the Ministry of Culture. Under the umbrella of an institution such as the Cairo Opera House they would be able to concentrate on serious work and not only on making a lot of noise. The same was done for the symphony orchestras, the Opera Company, the choirs, the ballet and modern dance. Under the supervision of the Opera they have received local and international recognition and however much people carp they are doing some excellent work."
"There is no reason why jazz shouldn't enjoy a similar recognition. For the time being we are giving young jazz groups the chance to perform at the Citadel or at the Opera's Open-Air Theatre, where they are making a name for themselves before flying away on their own. This year we have a new company, Al-Salaam, playing Arabic and international jazz. I would, however, like to see these jazz-formations under the supervision of professional jazz-men: a large public for jazz exists, and it should be catered for."
"This year we are honouring four musicians at the festival, flautist Inas Abdel- Dayem, singers Rida El-Wakil and Youssef Ezzat and the trumpet player Raouf El- Ganainy. I am happy with the festival this year, though I believe that it has massive potential and could yet expand to become a kind of Baalbek at the Citadel. This, though," muses Kami, beneath the velvet skies that envelop the fortress, "will take time and a great deal of work."
For a full programme of the Citadel Summer Festival of Music and Song see Listings
