Amjad Ali Khan’s Concert a Tribute to Gandhi: Antonio Guterres

United Nations: With his vision of music transcending nations and religions, sarod virtuoso Amjad Ali Khan lifted the General Assembly chamber from a venue of confrontations to an arena of peace and non-violence as he performed at the UN Day Concert. Speaking before the concert on Wednesday, Secretary-General Antonio Guterres recalled his visit to Raj Ghat earlier this month and said the concert’s theme of peace and non-violence was a tribute to the legacy of Mahatma Gandhi.

“Amjad Ali Khan and the Refugee Orchestra Project have crossed boundaries and cultures to enrich the societies where they perform. They remind us –as our (UN) Charter reminds us — that our diverse backgrounds are a cause for celebration rather than division,” Antonio Guterres said. Khan performed the “Vaishnava Janato”, the “Ram Dhun”, a Rabindra Sangeet and an Assamese folk song with his sons Amaan and Ayaan on the sarod and Amit Kavthekar on the tabla, and a vocal solo of a qalbana before they were joined by the Refugee Project Orchestra for the evening’s highlight, “Samgam” composed by him. Conducted by Lidiya Yankovskaya, the Refugee Project Orchestra, which brings together musicians who have fled to the US to escape violence and persecution as well as those who are friends and families of refugees, provided an accompaniment of western instruments to the sarod of Khan and his sons for a genre erasing traditional boundaries. Khan described it as a collaboration of Indian and western classical music. (IANS)