Recipient of the funding:
Zeitgenössische Oper Berlin

Cooperation partner:
Kultur Büro Elisabeth, CrossGeneration Media

Internet:
Female Voice of Afghanistan - Virtual music festival

Music Festival

Afghan female singers, introduced by cinematic portraits, perform concerts and virtually meet Europe-based musicians to create fusion songs.

In July 2021, ethnomusicologist Yalda Yazdani and ZOB director Andreas Rochholl traveled to Afghanistan for four weeks to film female singers living there. No one could have guessed at the time that this would be the last opportunity to document the lives of these female artists before the Taliban took power. After two successful festival editions (2017/2018) and the documentary "The Female Voice of Iran" (2020), the vision of making these voices audible across all borders was also to be realized for female artists in and from Afghanistan. As before, artistic connections were also made with musicians from Europe. In addition to the complex political situation in Afghanistan, overcoming the pandemic-related and geographical distance creatively presented the makers with enormous challenges. Nine singers of different biographical and musical backgrounds are portrayed: Mashal Arman, Rouya Doost, Gulshan, Freshta Farokhi, Sumaia Karimi, Sadiqa Madadgar, Naria Nour, Wajiha Rastagar and Ghawgha Taban; in addition, there will be a musical reading with author Mariam T. Azimi. After numerous stage projects, ZOB embarked on a search for new performative forms in the digital world even before the Corona pandemic. She has succeeded brilliantly with her YouTube channel, which now has more than 3 million views for the "Female Voice of Iran" playlist videos alone. "Female Voice of Afghanistan" will be an innovative digital festival from the experiences of stage, film, TV, documentary and social media.