After its well-received first season held in November, Sun Son’s (身聲創藝團隊) world music concert series returns, beginning tomorrow night.
Running until May 9, the two-month long gala presents a lineup of tribal sounds, traditional and fusion music from India, Latin America, eastern and southern Europe and the Middle East.
The music series is part of a grander project that artistic director Leonson Ng (吳忠良) has been working on for several years.
Having amassed an admirable collection of traditional musical instruments from around the world during its travels, the group, which formed out of the merger of Sun Son Theater (身聲演繹劇場) and a percussion ensemble, has long wished to draw attention to world music.
The plan to build a gallery to house the collection began to take shape early last year. A couple of typhoons, three floods and five months later, Sun Son celebrated the inauguration of its music gallery.
Musicians and performers from Sun Son open the current series with a performance that features dance, body movements, masks, the sounds of Turkish drums, gongs from Southeast Asia and traditional string instruments from Easter Island and Albania.
Many more musicians and groups follow in the coming weeks: the London Shamisen Club, which combines ballads from Turkey and the Balkans with an Asian twist; Hamnava, a Middle Eastern hand drum band known for fusing different types of ancient beats with contemporary rhythms; Japanese sitar plater Yo and tabla drummer Waka; and French pianist and accordionist Lionel Pinard.
Evening performances aside, activities will be held each Saturday.
Sun Son’s treasury of traditional musical instruments opens daily from 1pm to 9pm with free guided tours available. Visitors are encouraged to build instruments according to their own inspiration or have a go at drumming.
The scheduled lectures and courses will be conducted by Peter Kuhnsch, a university lecturer and multi-instrumentalist from Leipzig, Germany, who will introduce and demonstrate hand drums from the Middle East on March 7 and March 8. On March 14, Chou Chung-wen (周仲文), director of Human Music Gallery (人類音樂館) in Taichung City, explores the history and rhythms of tribal music.
Visit www.sunsontheatre.com for more information.
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