Ferhat Tunç is one of the most prominent Kurdish musicians of his generation. He has paid a high price for the right to sing in his own language, and has been subject to censorship, interrogations and imprisonment. In 1979, he was forced into exile, where he stayed for a decade. After returning to Turkey, his circumstances has been marked by a lack of safety. Will he be persecuted and imprisoned again, since he is still singing in his mother tongue, Kurdish?
Many of the lyrics on his previous album deal with the 1938 Kurdish genocide. His new album, on which Mari Boine and Knut Reiersrud are among the Norwegian contributors, bears the title Kobani, for the city that has been in the line of fi re in the Syrian Kurds’ resistance fight against ISIS.
Tunç has said, «my great mission as an artist, which is also my mission in life, is to defend people against injustice and persecution», and on his new album, he draws on Armenian and Yazidi as well as Kurdish musical traditions.
This night he is joined by, among others, Mari Boine, Ertan Tekik playing the duduk, Nils Einar Vinjor playing gitar, Runa Arnesen playing drums
and the choir Josefines elskere («Josephine’s lovers»).
The concert is a collaboration between The House of Literature and Kirkelig Kulturverksted.
English Concert with Ferhat Tunç, Mari Boine and more Wergeland Litteraturhuset Saladindagene 2016