15/08/2021

Sonic Nights at DokuFest are coming to its end, but last night’s performance by Mohammad Reza Mortazavi made the audience feel like they stopped in time just to enjoy music and have fun.

The Castle of Prizren has hosted numerous artists from all around the world bringing new cultures to the stage. This edition of DokuFest has been and is a celebration of creative minds from despite their medium of expression. Sonic Nights at the Sonar Cinema stage is proof of the versatility of artists who performed in Prizren and just showed how much people missed listening to music together.

Mohammad Reza Mortazavi performance welcomed everyone who wanted to have a good time and listen to every beat under the red lighted stage. Mortazavi is an Iranian artist based in Berlin, whose sound relies on playing instruments like daf (a traditional percussion instrument of Persian origin) and tombak (an Iranian goblet drum). Seeing him playing with different instruments while taking time to prepare for another flow of rhythm was soothing and mesmerising.

He as an artist tries to find the balance to tell the story through percussions, beats and flowing rhythms which can make everyone dance. Managing to deliver emotions skilfully and emotionally is hard to keep up and let yourself free to reinvent a new rhythm. His dedication to using instruments cooperates with the limits of the body, the ability to move and play under certain limitations. 

Using such traditional instruments can be a burden to invent a sound which are not alike those what we generally think when we listen to daf, or other culturally based instruments. The idea of expanding the range of what can a traditional tool do pinpoints to a certain sound which we might have hears from childhood. But the same sound can produce other emotions and atmospheres. Universalizing the sound of these instruments seems an important task to deliver, and Mortazavari, did just that in Prizren.

Showing how chameleonic sound can be opens new avenues of what music can do and what artists can produce or create. Mortazavi’s performance last night was surely one to remember. 

While everyone was cheering and clapping for him to play more, the artist set down once again and played his instrument combined creating a whole new other delightful party for everyone to listen.

Mortazavi’s performance is not the last staged in the castle. Everyone who wants to be part of a celebration of life, films and culture can immerse into the sound at the Sonar stage.

 Take a quick hike and then dance your heart out to the music.

 

See you there tonight, “Cesare dell’Anna and Opa Cupa” will be there for you after the closing ceremony.