Since 1997, the date of a historic concert in Sarajevo, Italian conductor Riccardo Muti has been orchestrating Les Routes de l’Amitié. Initiated within the framework of the Ravenna festival, they rely on the virtues of music to create a bridge between cultures and ease the fate of victims of cities suffering from war or natural disasters.
For 26 years, the conductor has brought together musicians from two nations to lead a series of concerts advocating a message of peace and brotherhood. Beirut, Jerusalem or Cairo have been visited in recent decades by Muti and his Cherubini orchestra.
This year, the maestro will conduct the young orchestra Luigi Cherubini accompanied by the choir of Cremona antica as well as musicians from the orchestra of the National Conservatory of Music of Amman, for three concerts. A choice driven by the desire to “pay tribute to the extraordinary generosity with which the Jordanian people have welcomed refugees fleeing the war in neighboring Syria for years”, announced the Ravenna festival on its official website.
On July 7, 9 and 11, the Mauro De André palace in Ravenna, the Roman amphitheater in Jerash, Jordan, and the site of Pompeii will resonate with pieces from the masterpieces of Gluck, Brahms and Bellini, between Orpheus and Eurydice, The Song of Destiny and the Norma. “Riccardo Muti will guide Italian and Jordanian musicians, united to invoke peace and fraternity in the universal language of sound”, emphasizes the Festival.
While in Jordan, Riccardo Muti and a delegation from the Ravenna Festival also plan to meet Syrian musicians living in the Zaatari refugee camp, one of the largest in the world built in an emergency in 2012, hosting more than 80,000 exiled.
