Honeycomb Way: A Musical Journey into the Sacred

The world is simply a better place for music. All music. The Koffler Centre of the Arts knows this and is all about fostering cultural collaboration – knowing that a platform of understanding between cultures is essential to bridging gaps between us, setting the stage for greater appreciation of our similarities and our differences.

Honeycomb Way: A Musical Journey into the Sacred is a project of the Kofflercelebrating Jewish musical expression in innovative ways – and this is exactly what will take place on Wednesday, March 28 at 8pm at the St. Lawrence Centre for the Arts.

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World-renowned musicians, Yair Dalal (an Israeli of Iraqi-Jewish descent) and New York-based Frank London (The Klezmatics) will spend a week in residence at the Koffler Centre of the Arts for the purpose of collaborating with a diverse group of top Toronto musicians to explore and create new music together – to be premiered at this grand, not-to-be-missed event.
 

This unique coming together of many cultural perspectives will present a marriage of Middle Eastern and Eastern European Jewish music together with Canadian perspectives to create a truly global result. As part of their residency, Dalal and London will also offer public talks and master classes and will meet with students across the GTA. The master class participants will join the core nine-piece ensemble on stage at the St. Lawrence Centre performance – truly bringing community together through music.

 

World music at its finest and most spontaneous will come together as Dalal – known for his compositions incorporating violin, oud and vocals drawing on Iraqi-Jewish music and the sounds of the Bedouins – and trumpeter London – a prolific composer and player in many projects, notably the Grammy-winning group The Klezmatics and Hasidic New Wave – collaborate with a who’s who of Canadian talent to form the Honeycomb Way ensemble. These stellar artists are:

 

–  5x Percussionist of the Year (Jazz Report Magazine), Rick Shadrach Lazar

   (Montuno Police; Samba Squad)

 

–  Lenka Lichtenberg – a composer and vocalist originally from Prague who

   sings in Yiddish, English, Czech, French, and Hebrew

 

–  Demetrios Petsalakis – a Greek-born, player of multiple stringed

   instruments (oud, electric guitar, bouzouki)

 

–  Debashis Sinha – a South Asian-Canadian world percussionist, noted

   electronica pioneer and video artist

 

–  Waleed Abdulhamid – versatile multi-instrumentalist and film-maker with

   deep roots in his Sudanese birthplace and the surrounding music of

   Egypt, Syria and Kuwait

 

–  Aviva Chernick – powerful lead singer of the Juno-nominated Jaffa Road who specializes in Balkan Ladino repertoire and composes contemporary prayer;

 

– … and last but not least, Maryem Tollar – an Egyptian-born Canadian vocalist and qanun player who specializes in traditional Arabic music as well as original compositions.

 

The possibilities are endless as Honeycomb Way blends rich Jewish musical traditions with the influence of other world cultures, rhythms and sounds to create something unique and powerful for this special once-in-lifetime performance.