“There is no way to peace; peace is the way,” wrote Gandhi.  As peace activists and creative artists, we are mindful that we make a culture of peace by both individual acts and group solidarity.  These include free expression, dialogue, coexistence work, and other “ways” to and of peace.

The concert pairs six visionary poets with two musical groups, representing among them Middle Eastern, South Asian, and East Asian cultures, in an evening based in concept on the new anthology Language for a New Century (Norton 2008) edited by Tina Chang, Nathalie Handal, and Ravi Shankar.  The Tony Khalife Group performs Middle Eastern and Indian world music and the Unity Nguyen Ensemble brings us traditional music of Vietnam and West Africa. Dissolving the boundaries separating us, the performance will create greater communitas, in the spirit of sacred space at the very heart of this Festival, first initiated by the Dalai Lama in 1999 as a call to peace and unity through the shared language of music.

Poets: Nathalie Handal is a Palestinian-American award winning poet, playwright, and writer. Tina Chang is author of Half-Lit Houses and co-editor with Ravi Shankar and Nathalie Handal of Language for a New Century (Norton 2008). Additional Middle Eastern, South Asian and Asian poets will appear, among them Elmaz Abinader, Russell Leong and Sesshu Foster.

Tony Khalife Group: Tony Khalife, Amir Efrat, Dominic Dean Breaux, Alex Spurkle, Jaqueline Fuentes, and Vivi Rama. Unity Nguyen Ensemble: Unity Nguyen, vocals, kora (21-string African harp), dan tranh (16-string Vietnamese zither). Professor Slap and Mandjou Koné

Produced by Jordan Elgrably, Jodie Evans, Adam Somers
Sponsored by CODEPINK, Levantine Cultural Center, PEN Center USA, SGI-USA