The Vancouver Inter-Cultural Orchestra’s annual Global Soundscapes Festival returns live and in-person June 9-12, 2022. Presenting a line-up of rich sound and rhythm, the Festival celebrates the intersection of traditional sounds and instruments from all over the world with contemporary classical music by Canadian composers.
Over the Festival’s four nights, The Cultch Historic Theatre stage will host concerts featuring outstanding local musicians and acclaimed national and international artists and groups. The first two nights spotlight the double bill of the Vancouver Erhu Quartet and 88 Strings (June 9), and Montreal’s innovative Ensemble Paramirabo(June 10). Featured international guest artist Ramiz Guliyev – a virtuoso on the Azerbaijani tar – makes his first-ever appearance in British Columbia with the Vancouver Inter-Cultural Orchestra under the baton of his son, renowned conductor Ayyub Guliyev (June 11). Ramiz Guliyev also performs June 12 in an intimate concert of traditional Azerbaijani music.
Mr. Guliyev’s performances in Vancouver offer a unique and fleeting opportunity to witness the talent of a towering figure in Azerbaijani culture, and in Middle Eastern music more generally.
The Global Soundscapes Festival concerts include:
Thursday June 9, 2022 | 8 pm
The festival’s opening night is an intercultural double bill featuring two extraordinary new Vancouver-based chamber ensembles.
Vancouver Erhu Quartet , created in 2020 the quartet explores the sonic possibilities from combining the erhu (Chinese violin) with western strings.
88 Strings mixes traditional Chinese, Persian and Western plucked instruments, specializing in new musical inventions and adventures written or arranged specifically for the group.
Friday June 10, 2022 | 8 pm
Ensemble Paramirabo, the Montreal-based intrepid and dedicated members of Ensemble Paramirabo come together as a single voice to perform contemporary music, showcase emerging Canadian composers, and expand the boundaries of the traditional concert experience.
Saturday June 11, 2022 | 8 pm
The Vancouver Inter-Cultural Orchestra (VICO) with Ramiz Guliyev (tar) and Ayyub Guliyev (guest conductor)
VICO is excited to welcome master musicians Ramiz Guliyev and Ayyub Guliyev to Vancouver for the first time, and to share the stage with them in this concert full of adventurous music that transcends borders and centuries. The concert features three world premieres.
Sunday June 12, 2022 | 3 pm
Ramiz Guliyev & Friends
Visiting virtuoso Ramiz Guliyev (tar) performs an intimate chamber programme of traditional Azerbaijani music. Mr. Guliyev is revered not only as an incandescent performer on the Azerbaijani tar (and described by a French critic in Liberation as “the Paganini of the East”), but also as an educator and ambassador for Azerbaijani music. His depth and knowledge, experience and understanding make him essentially a one-person repository for an entire national tradition.
Vancouver Inter-Cultural Orchestra’s Global Soundscapes Festival runs June 9-12, 2022, at The Cultch Historic Theatre. For more details and tickets to any of the individual Global Soundscapes Festival performances visit vi-co.org/global-soundscapes-festival-2022