Composer Kayhan Kalhor to Play Special Concert at The Town Hall

Kayhan Kalhor, Iran’s foremost contemporary composer, educator, and master musician, will offer a rare evening of Persian classical music at The Town Hall on November 30 at 7pm. It will be Kalhor's first large-scale concert of Persian classical music in New York City in over 10 years.

A Grammy-winning virtuoso of the kamancheh (a bowed, cello-like instrument often referred to as a spiked fiddle), Kalhor is a transcendent figure in the classical and global music worlds. He has performed Persian classical music as a soloist and as a member of various ensembles and orchestras, as well as through notable collaborations across musical and cultural traditions.

He was an original member of Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Project, co-founded the Persian “supergroup” The Masters of Persian Music with Mohammed Reza Shajarian and Hossein Alizadeh, created the Grammy-nominated Persian-Indian ensemble Ghazal with sitarist Shujaat Husain Khan, performed with orchestras including the New York Philharmonic, and recorded with the Kronos Quartet, the string quartet Brooklyn Rider, Malian kora master Toumani Diabaté, and Turkish virtuoso Erdal Erzincan.

Earlier this year, in a concert featuring Yo-Yo Ma and the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra, Kalhor premiered Venus in the Mirror, his double concerto for kamancheh, cello, and orchestra at the Elbphilharmonie Concert Hall in Hamburg, Germany. (His long association with Ma reflects in part the shared history of their instruments. The ancient kamancheh “is the father of many bowed instruments in the West,” offers Kalhor. “The cello is one of them.”)

His Town Hall appearance will be a rare celebration of pure Persian classical music, a tradition of unique depth, subtlety, and beauty. Kalhor says: “We come from a venerable culture that has made profound contributions to the world through a rich legacy of poetry, science, architecture, philosophy, and art, and that has shaped civilizations for centuries,” says Kalhor. He continues, “Through my music, I hope to reveal the splendor of my homeland, so often misrepresented and maligned. When people connect through music, the space opens for dialogue, awareness, and discovery.”

At Town Hall, Kalhor will be accompanied by one of setar player Kiya Tabassian, a master of the lute-like instrument, and Behrouz Jamali on tombak, a goblet drum considered the principal percussion instrument in Persian classical music. Musician, singer and composer Tabassian, a resident of Montreal, has explored the blending of Persian musical traditions and global styles. In 2017, he co-founded and has since served as artistic director of the Centre des Musiciens du Monde in Montreal. Jamali, in addition to his work as a percussionist, is also a music producer and documentary filmmaker. He is based in the United States.

Photo credit: Liudmilla Jefferies for Morgenland Festival Osnabrueck