Models strutted down the catwalk on Saturday at “Kaftan 2012,” the most prestigious traditional fashion show in Morocco.

It was the 16th edition of the annual fashion event in Marrakech, showcasing 12 established designers and two newcomers foreshadowing upcoming trends inspired by the traditional Moroccan kaftan.

“The treasures of Ibn Battuta” was the event’s theme, named after a prominent Moroccan traveler known for his adventures and voyages from Tangier. Ibn Battuta went to Haj in 1304 before setting on a world tour that took him to many countries in the Middle and Far East.

The kaftan, which is said to have originated from Iran, has become an icon of traditional Moroccan fashion and sophistication.

Myriam Jebbor, director and editor of the woman’s monthly magazine “Femmes du Maroc,” which supports the event, said the event attempts to surprise the Moroccan audience on an artistic level as well as meeting the event’s annual theme.

“Each edition is an individual one. Every time, we want to surprise the Moroccan public, on an artistic level. This year, we chose ‘The treasures of Ibn Battuta’ as a theme. We wanted to go back to origins and discover, through Ibn Battuta’s travels, various countries and cultures,” Jebbor said.

The show featured performances and artistic intervals from Ibn Battuta’s travels from Egypt, Turkey as well as Russia and a number of other countries. Some of the collections were designed by some of the most celebrated names in Moroccan Haute Couture.

Each kaftan is created delicately with hours of meticulous work by dozens of traditional artisans. Some of the collections display oriental influences.
Designer Meryem Boussikouk is a renowned name in traditional Moroccan fashion circles.

“We display the kaftans following the performances on the catwalk. Without them, we would not have this result. I take this opportunity to salute them and to tell them that they should persevere with their efforts and their art so that we could express ourselves as fashion designers with their help. Without them, we cannot do this,” Boussikouk said.

Wafae Faraj, the event’s backstage manager, works with more than 30 dressers helping the models prepare for the show.

“If a kaftan is not from Haute Couture, then it does not make it to the show because this event is organized only once a year. They call us the unknown soldiers and this pleases us. True, without us, the show could not take place on stage but without the people who appear on stage, there is no reason for our existence too. In fact, we complete each other.”

Jais Zinoun, a choreographer and former soloist with the San Francisco ballet who has graced many of the world’s stages, helped stage the show.

“These countries have an enormous wealth, both in dancing and in music. I invited some artists who will represent some countries such as Georgia and China. I used a lot of choreography because I am a choreographer and dancer myself and was inspired by the travelling theme.”

Proceeds from the show will be donated to two children’s charities.

http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2012/05/16/214504.html

The southern Moroccan city of Agadir will host the ninth edition of the Timitar Music Festival which will pay tribute to Amazigh music and culture.

The festival, which will take place on June 27-30, aims at acquainting the audience with Amazigh music, taking the culture to an international level by hosting a wide variety of singers who represent different dialects and music styles.

Performers at the Timitar festival will showcase bands, including Izenzaren, and singers such as Raissa Fatima Tihihit, Aicha Tashinwit, and Ammouri Mbarek. The festival will also pay tribute to famous late Amazigh singer Mohamed Rouicha.

A young Moroccan art consultant living in London launched her own online art gallery on 19 April 2012. The gallery, entitled Moroccan Fine Art, is accessible at www.moroccanfineart.com.

According director Nadia Echiguer, the aim of the operation is to promote contemporary Moroccan art in the United Kingdom and throughout the world.

At just 27, this young marketing graduate acts as an art consultant, an interior decorator, as well as being a private collector. Having been immersed in the art world since childhood, she decided to take the initiative in opening an art gallery dedicated to Moroccan art online.

The aim of the gallery is to help talented  and emerging Moroccan artists to make a name for themselves. To this end, Nadia Echiguer points out that her gallery only gives online visitors the opportunity to view works, but not to buy them.

In order to compensate for this lack of selling, Echiguer will be presenting its first exhibition of contemporary Moroccan art, entitled “An Urban Twist from Morocco”, at the Coningsby Gallery in London, from 7 to 12 May 2012. The show will feature 24 paintings and drawings in figurative, abstract, and calligraphic styles by 5 Moroccan artists: Larbi Cherkaoui, Kim Bennani, Said Yaghfouri, Zineb Echiguer, and Said Qodaid.

The organisation of the exhibition has taken some five months, as the works were transported from Morocco to the United Kingdom by boat. Moroccan Fine Art aims to organise around three or four such exhibitions every year.

http://www.artmediaagency.com/en/41681/moroccan-fine-art-opens-its-digital-doors/

FIFA President Joseph S. Blatter opened two artificial pitches at Morocco’s National Football Centre in Mâamora, near Salé on Sunday 29 April 2012. Accompanied by FIFA vice-president and CAF President Issa Hayatou and the President of the Royal Moroccan Football Federation (FRMF), Ali Fassi Fihri, Blatter inaugurated the pitches near the Moroccan capital Rabat as part of the Goal Project. “I’d like to congratulate the Royal Moroccan Football Federation for the remarkable work that has been done here. These wonderful facilities will accelerate football’s development and benefit the children of the future,” said the FIFA President.

“I am delighted that the Federation organised a women’s match on inauguration day,” Blatter said before providing further proof of his pleasure by giving the match a ceremonial kick-off.

Following the inauguration, the FIFA delegation visited the Mohammed VI Football Academy, a top-notch training centre for youths aged 13 to 18, many of whom have been selected for the national side at underage levels.

On Monday 30 April, President Blatter will meet with the Minister for Youth and Sport, Mohamed Ouzzine, before holding discussions with representatives from the FRMF at Federation headquarters.

A meeting with International Olympic Committee member Nawal El Moutawakel is also planned, before the FIFA President brings his Moroccan trip to an end with a press conference.

FIFA held its first-ever Congress on African soil in Marrakesh back in 2005, and the FIFA Club World Cup will be staged in Morocco in 2013 and 2014. Morocco have also qualified for the Men’s Olympic Football Tournament London 2012, where they will take on Spain, Honduras and Japan in the group stage.

The FIFA delegation will then head on to Algiers for a two-day tour that will include the opening of the new Algerian Football Federation headquarters, also built with support from the Goal Project.

Confederation of African Football/30/03/2012

http://www.afriquejet.com/morocco-blatter-inaugurates-two-goal-projects-2012050137733.html

A Memorandum of Understanding was signed at the Oman Chamber of Commerce and Industry yesterday between the OCCI and the Moroccan Centre for Export Promotion (Maroc Export) on enhancing technical co-operation and exchanging information.
The MoU was signed by Khalil bin Abdullah al Khonji, OCCI Chairman, and Saad Eldin bin Abdullah, Executive Director of Maroc Export, in the presence of Tariq al Hussaisan, Ambassador of Morocco to the Sultanate, Omani investors and members of the Moroccan delegation. This came during a seminar on Morocco-Oman Trade Relations which was held at the OCCI on the sidelines of the Moroccan delegation’s visit.

Al Khonji aid that the MoU would strengthen bilateral relations thereby helping Omani business people to explore investment opportunities in Morocco. He noted that the seminar provided an opportunity for both sides to get familiarised with the investment opportunities in the two countries. The Moroccan ambassador noted that the visit of the Moroccan delegation would enhance the efforts from both sides to impede the obstacles facing economic and trade co-operation, hoping that the visit will achieve raising the level of relations.

He exhorted the Omani and Moroccan sides to enhance the co-operation and trade exchange as there are many promising investment opportunities in the tourism, real estate and industry sectors. The ambassador stressed the importance of setting up a joint investment company, launching a sea link to facilitate the transport of goods and commodities and easing visa procedures for Moroccan businessmen.

http://main.omanobserver.om/node/93226

Argan oil is one of Morocco’s most unique and popular products. Click here to see a great video from Conde Nast Traveler on how it is made. 

On the back roads of southwestern Morocco there’s not a lot happening. But just 15 to 20 minutes outside the coastal town of Essaouira, along the road to Marrakech, you can find not only unique souvenirs, but extremely authentic ones at Cooperative d’Argan Marjana. (Bonus points if you spot one of the many goats in trees along this road contentedly chomping on argan tree fruit.)

At the cooperative, more than 20 women work in a long rectangular room, each completing their part of the process of extracting argan oil from a fruit harvested in local orchards (the trees look similar to olive trees). I was interested to learn the popular Moroccan argan oil isn’t only used for beauty products. In fact, no part of the argan fruit is wasted: Pulp from inside the husks is fed to farm animals, and while the nut is either made into oils, soaps, and lotions for hair and skin, it’s also edible when roasted—and quite tasty.

There are a number of women’s co-ops in this part of the country, easily found along the roadside. They were formed independently by groups who decided to take their economic fate into their own hands. The co-ops have no single owner, and everyone has a say in the operations whether married, single, widowed, or divorced. The lovely young woman in my video tour here (who preferred not to have her face on camera) described the establishment of the co-ops as a way for women “to become independent from the men.” And as you can see, they are quite busy at work, and quite happy to show their skills.

I ended up with quite a stash of hair oil, face cream, and soaps for gifts back home.

Amid the eager and often conflicting discussions about what it’s going to take to develop a real, tangible green economy in North Africa – one that makes the most of a seemingly endless supply of solar and wind – one conclusion keeps rising to the surface. If there is one state – one organized national campaign to lead the way -  it’s going to be Morocco.

With Tunisia and Algeria eager but bogged down by political and infrastructure issues and Libya a question mark as far as stability is concerned, all eyes have fallen on Morocco to prove that renewables can work. Even Egypt, with solar and wind projects underway and promised, will be looking to Rabat for guidance, said Thiemo Gropp, Director of Desertec Foundation, an energy initiative aimed at developing a renewable market across the Southern Mediterranean.

In terms of offering the kind of progress that appeals to both foreign investors wary of North Africa and locals eager to avoid the kind of lop-sided distribution seen with oil and gas efforts, Morocco’s solar projects serve up a real possible way to show how the cake gets divided, said Mohamed El-Ashry, a UN Senior Fellow active in energy issues in the region.

El-Ashry and others have pointed to the country’s progress in terms of what they see as anchor projects, meant to show tangible results for those in and out of the region. The most prominent among these is a planned $2.8 billion concentrated solar project, meant to produce 500 MW and scheduled to start construction this year.  Without these anchor projects taking shape soon, convincing anyone to support the kind of long-term financing and political support needed to see the region’s renewable sector through would be challenging.

Despite the pressure, Said Mouline, the director of Morocco’s Agency for the Development of Renewable Energy was content with the anticipation and eager to make the most of the country’s leadership role. Mouline traces the country’s early adoption of renewable options back to Morocco’s heavy dependence on foreign energy, explaining this week that that context was simply different than oil-rich neighbors in Algeria and Libya. It began with a high-energy bill.

Currently dependent on imports for 97 percent of its energy needs, Morocco has worked to reduce its dependence on foreign sources through the development of domestic projects, including exploring newly found traditional reserves and shale projects. Recently; however, the state’s embrace of solar and wind has become a pillar of the country’s energy policy.

“Throughout its Energy Strategy, Morocco aims at cutting down its dependency on fossil fuels and at reducing the huge charge it is making on the country’s budget,” said Fouad Douiri, Morocco’s newly appointed Minister of Energy, Mines, Water and the Environment earlier this week. “In order to achieve this goal, renewable energy in all its forms is considered as a priority in the Moroccan energy strategy, which is based on a balanced mix of energy where clean fossil fuels are combined with renewable energies as well as energy efficiency.”

Douiri went on to cite a series of laws passed in 2009, providing the foundation and grid support for the country’s renewable efforts, including the creation of the National Agency for Renewable Energy Development and Energy Efficiency and the Moroccan Agency for Solar Energy (MASEN). The laws also gave “the right to producers to use the network of ONE (National Office of Electricity), which is the national grid operator,” adding that they “would be allowed to build their own network in case of energy export if the national transmission and interconnection capacities were not sufficient.”

Alongside international partner efforts like Desertec and Transgeen, the laws were set up to help the country to increase the country’s installed renewable energy capacity from the current 26% to 42% by 2020 (14% from solar, 14 % from wind and 14% from hydropower). It helps to have the technology and economic support, Mouline explained, but what really matters is the political will.

Despite the momentum behind the country’s renewable efforts, advocates in Rabat have plenty of roadblocks ahead, both at home and abroad. In Morocco, ensuring funding for needed research and development could take a hit from the country’s current economic ills. Morocco may have avoided the kind of political uprisings that swept across the rest North Africa over the last year, but it came a significant cost in the form of heavy spending aimed at easing unrest and unemployment.

However, the country’s challenges will not affect how Rabat will support renewable efforts, said Douiri. When asked if the country’s elections or economic woes would change the government’s green approach, the Minister responded, “Absolutely not, the RE strategy is a strategic priority. Nothing will affect our policy choices in this sector.”

Looking for funding from foreign partners could be equally as challenging as many of Morocco’s most active trading partners – and mainly Spain – are struggling to keep afloat themselves, let alone have enough left over to invest in Morocco’s green dreams.

Still, advocates like Mouline are adamant about not sacrificing their position in the region in exchange for investment, no matter how bad things get. For them, it’s a political issue as much as it is economic or environmental.

“We believe this should be a co-effort between the north and south (Mediterranean),” Mouline said, but with development in terms of jobs, infrastructure and energy use in the south taking precedent over any energy needs in the north.

Further, Mouline continued, the development of Morocco’s green economy can help strengthen ties behind a common push towards the kind of shared benefits critics felt were lost in the development of hydrocarbons over the last 30 years.

“We want to look at solar and wind development in the same way as oil or gas in terms of development, but not in terms of how they were controlled,” Mouline said. “Given the right circumstances (with solar and wind), everybody can win.”

http://www.forbes.com/sites/christophercoats/2012/04/18/is-morocco-the-mediterraneans-green-energy-savior/

Morocco had not yet invited us in.

We were two Americans traveling through Morocco, no tour, no guide, my daughter Zoe and me in the back seat of a wild-man driver who aimed to pass every car in front of us for the nine hours from Marrakech to Fez. He swerved, he sped, he called it magnificent driving. “Driving safe is like art,” he bragged. “You know? Like painting.”

We slid down low in the rear seat and, thanks to Zoe’s iPod and episodes of “This American Life,” sweated out the ride.

Landing in a city with no discernible center of town, where the main roads were slivered like alleys and the alleys were nothing but halved sidewalks, we dodged stray cats and clusters of smokers with live rabbits for sale. We took refuge in doorways when scooters fumed by.

This made it all the more unusual, and so all the more uplifting, to receive a call the following morning at our hotel from a woman who invited us to her home. It was Passover, and we had no plans.

The caller was Danielle Mamane, Sephardic cookbook author of “The Scent of Orange Blossoms.” Weeks before, I’d emailed her co-author, Kitty Morse, to see if Kitty still led culinary tours of her homeland. She did not. But that’s how Danielle knew we were American Jews traveling to Fez, and that we were staying at Riad Le Calife. I’d never met either woman.

Although she was hosting 18 for a second night Seder that evening, Danielle said how rude it’d be to know there were Jews here in Fez, sent by Kitty Morse, and though it was such a busy day of the year she just had to invite us, even if it was for lunch. “And don’t bring anything.”

A Moroccan host prepares all the food. There is no potluck meal — my custom at home — so Danielle hired extra help for the day.

Her wildly printed blouse and large black glasses are still etched in my mind. As well, the tidy salon where she served glasses of mint tea with orange blossoms and platters of sauteed fava beans sprinkled with a pinch of cumin, a characteristic spice of North Africa.

This was a Sephardic home. The Jews from Spain, Portugal and the Middle East permit eating beans during the holiday but the Ashkenazic Jews do not. They are strict about legumes because they puff up and grow when water is added to them. The table was set for seven: Danielle’s husband, Jacques, and their daughter Helene, who had come from Paris with her 3-year-old and 8-year-old. And us. The air was drenched with the aroma of freshly picked orange blossoms.

A dozen little tastes made me fall for this lunch: Egg souffle with spinach and herbs. Baba ganoush. Tomatoes with lemon, beets, cucumber, carrots and lettuce. A phrase from our Haggadah ran through my mind: It would have been enough. But an entree followed. Meatballs with the gradually unfolding distinct taste of liver. A side of peas and carrots. Matzo from Holland.

The cake with poppy seeds was smothered with candied oranges that were pressed and flattened, cooked with pounds of sugar until a dark amber syrup was released. Bittersweet, my weakness.

Our conversations skidded through how we teach Hebrew to talk about modernist cuisine. They wondered, did we like molecular gastronomy? Why shouldn’t food look like it is? What is meatloaf? CSAs (community supported agriculture)? You guarantee the farmer his income? What’s a cookie sheet? Oh, and what is Spandex?

And so it went for the next three hours. Strangers from two continents forging a new friendship, crystallizing what it is that makes traveling and the kindness of strangers so memorable.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/features/food/sc-food-0330-moroccan-passover-20120402,0,162137.story

Take three blonde girls, fly them to Morocco and lead them into the souks of Fes.

A smart idea from an adventure-loving father? Or a crazy plan likely to end in disaster?

It was time for a different sort of holiday. I’d first been to Fes on my gap year and returned on my honeymoon, bringing the new Mrs Milton to sample its treasures.

Now, it was the Big One: a family holiday in a city infamous for its hustlers, false guides, peddlers, crooks and carpet-selling uncles.

Inside its crenellated ramparts, a staggering 300,000 inhabitants live, work and eke out a living. Many are experts in crafts that died out centuries ago in Europe.

They include tanners, blacksmiths, potters and professional scribes. Each trade has its own quarter and the noises, sights and pungent smells assault your senses as you pass from one to the next.

‘Are you sure it’s safe?’ asked my daughters as we embarked on our adventure. They knew all about last April’s bomb in Marrakech, as well as the revolutions that have swept the Arab world.

‘Safer than London,’ I said, and I meant it.

But tourism was hit hard in the aftermath of the bombing. Hotels struggled and, while we were in Fes, few holidaymakers wandered the souks. We were almost the only visitors in the greatest medieval city in the Arab world.

This was somewhat unnerving, because we stuck out like sore thumbs. With our pale skin, blonde hair and blue eyes, we’d have made convincing locals in Sweden. In Morocco, we didn’t cut the mustard.

We arrived on a sweltering June evening and plunged straight into the heart of the old city. Our girls didn’t know what had hit them: they were wide-eyed with astonishment.

And with good reason. There are no cars, buses or taxis. The streets are so narrow and twisted that the only transport is by mule or donkey.

Forget looking for a Marks & Spencer or Gap. Instead, you find thousands of little stores scarcely larger than a cupboard, in which the owner is, as likely as not, chiselling away at a bowl he’s hoping to sell you later.

We passed an aromatic spice stall with teetering piles of yellow turmeric and brick-red paprika. A merchant tried to sell us handbags and wallets. A stray cat got tangled under our feet. Someone was peddling tortoises. A child was stroking a chameleon.

‘That’s truly disgusting,’ said Heloise, 13, as we passed a butcher’s stand.

There was not a cellophane-wrapped lamb chop in sight. Here, the meat is newly butchered – sometimes in front of your eyes.

Three sheep heads were on display, a sign of the meat’s freshness. Fifteen-year-old Madeleine was philosophical. ‘At least we know it hasn’t gone off,’ she said.

Horseplay: Fes is a city where the medieval world still looms amid cluttered streets

There’s shouting, arguing and the call to prayer from one of the city’s 300 minarets. And everywhere there are people – a constant, jostling crowd that seems to be going nowhere.

In recent years, many of Fes’s 19th century mansions have become hotels (known as riads), oases of luxury. We had chosen Le Riad Maison Bleue, which has the bonus of a little pool in the central courtyard.

This became our refuge when the blistering heat of the afternoon got too much to bear.

We’d relax until 5pm, then head back into the souks for a refreshing glass of sweet mint tea.

Fes is a labyrinth on a grand scale. Forget GPS. Don’t even bother with a map. Nothing leads to where you think it will. Endless hustlers try to ‘help’. Ignore them all. We found a polite request for directions from a store-holder almost always got us back to where we wanted to be.

You’ll need to get some sense of orientation, because Fes has a number of must-see sights.

The medieval tanneries, still in daily use, are the No1 attraction. In scores of giant vats, men are immersed to their waists in brilliantly coloured liquids and they tread the leather pelts until the colour is impregnated. ‘It stinks,’ was the comment from our youngest daughter.

She was right: the tanneries do stink. The skins are cured in urine and pigeon dung so acrid that it burns your nostrils.

Among the city’s most sumptuous sites is the nearby Glaoui Palace. In any other place in the world, this would be a major attraction – a rambling 19th century edifice that’s dripping with oriental opulence. Yet here in Fes, it’s not even (officially) open to the public.

But as so often in Morocco, a loud rap on the door summons the guardian who – for a few dirhams – will show you around.

As the heat grew ever more intense, we hired a car and drove into the Middle Atlas mountains. Their contours start to rise from the arid plain 35 miles to the south of Fes and they offer an enticingly different climate.

The air cooled and the breezes freshened: soon, the countryside began to change.

The hills surrounding the market town of Imouzer du Kandar were fringed with trees and the town was bursting at the seams with water. Two lakes, hundreds of springs and dozens of fast-flowing rivulets provide a natural freshness to the air.

We climbed higher, stopping at the bizarre ski-town of Ifrane. Locals call this Moroccan Switzerland with good reason. There may be no cuckoo clocks but there are gabled roofs aplenty. We pushed further south, climbing over a stack of barren mountains.

We had intended to return to Fes that afternoon, but the coolness of the air (and spectacular scenery) made us pause.

We stopped in the Berber village of Ain Leuh and stumbled across the Auberge Le Magot de L’Atlas.

‘Do you have any free rooms?’ we asked the genial manager.

‘They’re all free,’ he said. ‘There’s no one here. Take your pick.’

We decided to sleep in the main salon, a room so decorative it looked set for a wedding.

Cutting a splash: Aurelia admires an unexpected waterfall in the Atlas Mountains

We headed further south the following morning – encountering spectacular Barbary apes, a fantastic waterfall cut out of a gorge, and a huge, shimmering lake on the ‘Route des Cedres’ that we had all to ourselves – before we arrived back in Fes later that evening.

‘Ah, my friends,’ shouted stallholders, hustlers and guides as we jostled our way through the souk. ‘You’re back.’

It was a curious feeling. Everyone knew who we were; everyone wanted to be our friend. We had become instant celebrities.

‘I wonder how they remember us,’ said my youngest daughter Aurelia, who is nine.

She looked at her sisters and me – all fair-haired and pink with sunburn – and let out a peal of laughter.

‘I guess we don’t really look Moroccan,’ she said.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/article-2123515/Morocco-holidays-A-family-adventure-Fes.html?ito=feeds-newsxml

Since its founding in 1994, the William & Mary Middle Eastern Music Ensemble has hosted multiple guest artists from a variety of traditions. But this semester is the first time that they have hosted musicians from abroad.

Nasreddine Chaabane and Amina Bensaad, musicians from Morocco, are in the midst of a two-week residency that will culminate in a performance with the ensemble on March 30. The free concert of North African Andalusi Music will take place at Williamsburg Regional Library at 8 p.m.

Chaabane and Bensaad came to William & Mary thanks to the efforts of Jonathan Glasser, a visiting instructor of anthropology.

Glasser has been playing with the ensemble since his arrival in Williamsburg in 2006. This year, as part of his new tenure track position in anthropology, he was able to use professional development funds to support the residency of Chaabane and Bensaad, musicians he worked with while doing fieldwork in Oujda, Morocco.

“Most new faculty at William and Mary use start-up funds for equipment, materials, or their own research,” said Anne Rasmussen, director of the ensemble and chair of the Department of Music. “It’s unique that Professor Glasser is using his professional development funds to invite his musical colleagues from Morocco.  The ensemble has been hard at work learning a full program of ‘Andalusi’ (North African) repertoire and we are very excited to host these musicians.  Since 1994 the ensemble has hosted over 20 guest artists, but we’ve never had the opportunity for such a long residency. We will all be speaking Arabic by the time they leave!”

During the last two weeks, the ensemble has been working with Chaabane and Bensaad through rehearsals and workshops in preparation for the Friday night concert.

“Nasreddine Chaabane and Amina Bensaad are leading musicians in the Moroccan city of Oujda and have travelled with their group ‘Association Ahbab Cheikh Salah’ to many places throughout North Africa and Europe,” said Glasser. “This will be their first visit to the U.S. and I am excited that we will be able to introduce them to the ensemble, the College, and the wider community.  The association that they run is dedicated to teaching young people the Andalusi tradition of North Africa, so in many ways this will be a perfect fit.”

Students in the ensemble as well as those in Glasser’s senior seminar, “North African Music,” had been preparing for the couple’s visit all semester and eagerly anticipated their arrival.

Ensemble Assistant Tiffany Schoneboom ’12 said that she expected to benefit from the experience both as an ‘ud (stringed instrument) player in the ensemble and as a student in Glasser’s senior seminar.

“This is an incredible opportunity for me to experience this music culture first-hand,” she said.

http://www.wm.edu/news/stories/2012/meme.php