Most of its foreign members packed their bags and left

Like “Titanic” .. the orchestra continues to play .. and Lebanon is drowning

• We hope now that things will improve, Lebanon will get back on its feet and foreign musicians will return.

  Reuters

• Mona Qesta Semaan: We hope now that things will improve, Lebanon will get back on its feet and foreign musicians will return.

  Reuters

• Most of the musicians have left the band.

  Reuters

• Baalbaki during the band's rehearsal.

  Reuters

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The Lebanese National Orchestra was preparing for the opening ceremony of the season in the absence of half of the musicians, and its conductor, Lebanon Baalbaki, faced a painful reality, as he had two options: either he presents a prepared piece for an entire ensemble despite the limited number, or prepares a copy for a smaller number of players.

On the day of the concert, three other musicians appeared, defying the pressures of the economic crisis, which prompted dozens of their colleagues to leave the band, and Baalbaki managed to play the original score.

similarity

With words dripping with bitterness and bleeding pain, he told "Reuters": "Our feeling was similar to the moment the Titanic sank, and how he held that the music remained alive, despite everything that was happening."

A veil of fog damages the band's future, makes expectations impossible, and the question remains: "How long will you be able to continue?"

The National Orchestra was not spared the consequences of the financial crisis, which pushed many into poverty, to the extent that securing the basic necessities of life became a difficult task.

Other factors combined to deepen the wounds such as the “Covid-19” pandemic and the Beirut explosion in August 2020 that killed more than 215 people and devastated parts of the city, including the National Conservatory of Music, where orchestras train and perform.

After the currency collapse, the salaries of about 100 musicians in the band dropped from $3,000 to just about $200.

Most of its foreign members packed their bags and left.

Baalbaki says: “The orchestra numbered about 100 musicians.

She performed very large works, covering if we want all the classics.

Now it is difficult to do some of the big jobs that we used to do before.”

The wages of those who remained so far hardly exceed the price of fuel needed to access the weekly training sessions, which forced Baalbaki to reduce the number of concerts from dozens of concerts per year to what can be counted on the fingers of one hand.

However, the situation for the National Orchestra is just a mirror on which the greatest decline is reflected in all arenas and at all cultural levels in Lebanon.

Among the victims of the combination of the crisis and the epidemic are the summer festivals that were previously a beacon of arts in the region, including the presence of the masters of music, singing and Arab symbols.

Mona Kasta Semaan, the violinist who has been working in the band since its re-establishment in 2000, has fond memories of her performance with Spanish tenor Placido Domingo amid the Roman ruins of Baalbek, in the early 2000s.

The band was discontinued during the Lebanese civil war from 1975 to 1990.

"She suffocates when she watches the orchestra on TV," she says now.

She adds, "She is now hopeful that things will improve, Lebanon will get back on its feet, and foreign musicians will return."

sectarian

Before the economic crisis erupted, the National Conservatory of Music remained impotent and paralyzed for nearly 10 years, due to the sectarian power-sharing system in Lebanon, in which prestigious positions in public institutions are distributed among politicians, who appoint their loyalists without giving any consideration to the element of competence .

When the head of the conservatory, Walid Gholmieh, an Orthodox Christian, died in 2011, it was not possible to find a replacement to hold the position permanently for seven years.

It was decided to appoint two acting presidents.

The first was a bureaucrat with no musical qualifications, and the second, seen as qualified for the position, was not appointed permanently because he was Catholic, not Orthodox.

Finally, the Lebanese musician Bassam Saba assumed the position in 2018 after returning from the United States, but he died last year from complications from the “Corona” virus.

Baalbaki fears that it will take years to appoint a successor.

He said: "We are prisoners...we are the conservatory, all the musicians and artists, and the fate of art and music in Lebanon. We are prisoners in this country, prisoners of this political class that insists on entering the sectarian spirit."

Despite that, he says, "the musicians will continue to play."

He adds: "We were created in this country, and this is our destiny to find solutions and create new opportunities."

• The National Orchestra was not spared the consequences of the financial crisis, which pushed many into poverty, to the extent that securing the basic necessities of life became a difficult task.

• After the collapse of the currency, the value of the salaries of about 100 musicians in the band decreased from 3000 dollars to about 200 dollars only.

Mona Qusta Semaan:

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