co-pro

Interharmonic Ensemble –
Melodic Bridges

Under the musical direction of musician and composer Tayfun Guttstadt, ‘Melodic Bridges’ is a concert at the interface between the Middle Eastern music style maqam and classical, jazz and bossanova. With the participation of Turkish singer Dilek Türkan, Syrian oud player (arabic fretless lute) Wassim Mukdad and Israeli double bassist Haggai Cohen-Milo, new arrangements of traditional pieces and original compositions will be performed. In ‘Melodic Bridges’, Middle Eastern musical tradition and Western classical music meet on the surface. At the same time, oriental improvisation meets classical virtuosity. 

Ensemble

GUITAR, 6-STRINGED BAGLAMA, NEY, LUTE Tayfun Guttstadt // VOICE Dilek Türkan // CONTRABASS Haggai Cohen-Milo // OUD Wassim Mukdad // CULTURAL MANAGEMENT Babak Shafian

Tayfun Guttstadt

... is a multi-instrumentalist, producer and singer from a German-Turkish family in Hamburg. He is an integral part of the music scene in Germany and abroad and has played with names such as Yinon Muallem, Özlem Taner, Yair Dalal, Alan Bern, Wassim Mukdad, Betin Güneş, Danai Loukidi, Milad Khawam, Daniel Kahn and many others. He is also known for his workshops on makam music, which he has given at the Barenboim-Said Akademie, the Yiddish Summer Weimar, the Hochschule für Musik und TheaterHamburg and the Berlin Exploratorium, among others. In his debut album ‘tarâpzâde’, he combines modern hip-hop with classical Turkish music.  

Dilek Türkan

... born in Turkey, she is one of the best-known interpreters of classical Turkish music. She has given concerts with various groups, in particular with the Istanbul Ladies and İncesaz groups. She participated as a soloist in the albums ‘Kervansaray’ by YarkınRitim Group, ‘Dört/Mazi Kalpmde’ and ‘Altı/Kalbimdeki Deniz’ by İncesaz and again as a singer in the album ‘Üç/İstanbul'aDair’ by İncesaz. She has also released her own Turkish music albums. As a singer, she joined the Cemal Reşit Rey Turkish Music Ensemble in 2005 and the Istanbul State Choir for Turkish Classical Music in 2006. In 2009 she won the Blue Note Music Award 2008. 

Haggai Cohen-Milo

... born in Isarel, he studied at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston with Danilo Pérez, Bob Moses, Jamey Haddad and Jerry Bergonzi. His debut album ‘Penguin’ was released in 2014. He was part of Omer Klein's trio, with whom he released several albums, and then formed a collaborative trio with him and Amir Bresler, which released the album ‘Life & Fire at Warner’ in 2023. He was also a member of the Evgeny Lebedev World Trio, the Rotem Sivan Trio and the Alon Farber Hagiga Sextet. For more than ten years, Cohen-Milo has been developing his own method in collaboration with dancers and choreographers, which acts as a link between sound, movement and visual art in performance art. Cohen-Milo has written works for theatre and dance, including ‘Jephta's Daughter’ (2015) in collaboration with director and choreographer Saar Magal for the Bavarian State Opera. 

Wassim Mukdad

... is a musician born in Syria and based in Berlin. He plays the oud, composes and conducts various ensembles, specialising in several genres such as tarab and traditional music, blending elements of oriental and western music culture. Wassim has been part of several theatre and opera performances, for example at the Maxim Gorki Theatre and the Komische Oper Berlin. He has performed in Germany, Denmark and Sweden and is also involved in various other music projects such as the Berlin Oriental Group, the Husam Al-Ali Ensemble and the Arabic Music Quartet, which are mixed bands with Syrian, Italian, Israeli, Russian and German musicians that convey a message of peace and diversity. 


(c) photo Wassim Mukdad, bottom left: Anton Tal
(c) photo Haggai Cohen-Milo, bottom right: Daniel Menan

The concert is sponsored by the Anna Lindh Foundation as part of ‘Sounds That Connect... The Day of the Mediterranean’ and is organised in cooperation with the Office for Further Education and Culture of the Tempelhof-Schöneberg district of Berlin.