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Some 120,000 festival-goers vibrated to the enchanting rhythms of fusions, finding in four cities of the Kingdom the magic of the Gnaoua Festival, which is one of the most popular and appreciated events in the cultural landscape, indicated, on Saturday, the organizers of the Gnaoua Festival Tour, placed under the High Patronage of His Majesty King Mohammed VI. The four stages of the Festival, namely Essaouira, Marrakech, Casablanca and Rabat, met with success beyond expectations, they underlined in a press release closing this special edition. “The public responded with strength and joy, as did the artists, with a dialogue that was played on stage, every evening, during the 30 concerts of the Festival”, they added. According to the organizers, the Gnaoua maâlems have once once more proven the strength of their heritage and the success of the exchange, inviting musicians from all over the world to share, create a renewed dialogue and contribute to the enrichment of diversity. culture and human creativity. The Gnaoua Festival Tour was a real success with more than 150 artists, including 23 maâlems who performed during 30 colorful and emotional concerts, in addition to an exceptional artistic program thought out, created and carried out with passion by the two artistic directors. , the great maalem Abdeslam Alikane and the talented drummer Karim Ziad, the same source said. Moments of pure musical magic during fusions will remain in the annals, such as those tinged with jazz by Avishai Cohen Trio with saxophonist Emile Parisien and accordionist Vincent Peirani in fusion with the great Hamid El Kasri at the end of the tour in Rabat , enriched by the sweetness of Nabyla Maan, those charged with energy from the Trio Assala, or the Cubans of CimaFunk with the maâlems Khalid Sansi and Ismail Rahil. Recalling that in December 2019, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco), which considers intangible cultural heritage as a crucible of cultural diversity and guarantor of sustainable development, granted the status of intangible cultural heritage of humanity in the Gnaoua, the press release specifies that “The Gnawa culture continues to gain in popularity and vitality, in Morocco and throughout the world”, affirming that the artists present during this exceptional tour, musicians and musicians from Morocco and the 15 invited countries, showed the power of cultural mixing when artistic encounters create bridges.
In addition, the musicians, who were present in force, enchanted the public and conquered the press through the performances of the two malemates, Asmaa Hamzaoui and the young Hind Ennaira, the Senegalese with the golden voice Kya Loum, the guardian of the temple of Moroccan song, Soukaina Fahsi, the bewitching Hindi Zahra, the virtuoso flautist Naïssam Jalal, the singer Fama Mbaye from Mauritania, the American drummer prodigy of Avishai Cohen Trio Roni Kaspi and the profound Nabyla Maan, a true trait of union between contemporary music and the Arab-Andalusian tradition. The organization of the Gnaoua Festival Tour confirms this in the wake of 22 successful editions of the Gnaoua and World Music Festival, thus taking up the challenge of crossing generations. After two years of stoppage due to Covid-19, the festival’s tour through 4 cities has once once more demonstrated the remarkable ability of the Gnaoua to federate and participate in the promotion of the values ​​of openness, tolerance and share. And the same source recalls that the producer of the festival, Neïla Tazi, declared during the closing evening that the organizers have from the beginning chosen to approach this project as if it were an inexhaustible treasure. waiting to be discovered and conquered, that of “our popular culture and our youth”. The Gnaoua Festival Tour was also an opportunity to allow the new generation of Gnaoua artists to show the full extent of their talent, alongside big names in Tagnaouite, featuring the next generation of Gnaoua and young Maâlems, who have taken up the torch and have become the guarantors of sustainability.

The kick-off of the International Festival of Mediterranean Cinema of Tetouan (FCMT) was given on Friday evening at the Spanish Teatro, in the presence of several personalities from the world of politics, media, arts and culture.

This major film event, which this year celebrates its 27^th anniversary brings together big names in national, Arab and international cinema, making the city of Tetouan the capital of Mediterranean cinema and a space for exchange and promotion of the culture of dialogue and tolerance.

During the opening ceremony, vibrant tributes were paid to Franco-Belgian actress Déborah François, Spanish actor Alex Brendemühl and Moroccan director Nour-Eddine Lakhmari. History to highlight different paths of Mediterranean artists, their specificities and their singularity. In a statement to Libé, Déborah François said she was honored and proud to receive this tribute in one of the biggest film festivals in Morocco, while emphasizing that this distinction is for her a testimony to the evolution of her career. professional.

The Minister of Youth, Culture and Communication, Mohamed Mehdi Bensaid, for his part stressed that this Festival reflects Morocco’s openness to its Mediterranean environment, and embodies the importance of the cultural dimension, in a context nationally marked by the new development model, which places culture as a strategic axis, and in a regional context marked by the solid bilateral and multilateral relations that Morocco maintains with the Mediterranean countries.

In a speech read on his behalf by the Secretary General of the Department of Communication, Mustapha Taimi, Mr. Bensaid indicated that this edition is not limited to the resumption of cinematographic activity in Tetouan, following an interruption linked to the pandemic. of Covid-19, but refers to the symbolism and singular artistic value of this international event on the Mediterranean scene, since it has contributed, for years, to enriching the Mediterranean cinematographic debate.

This ceremony was also marked by the presentation of the feature film jury, chaired by the Ivorian director, Jacques Trabi, with alongside him the Spanish director and actress Mabel Lozano, the Moroccan novelist and film critic, Mohamed Laroussi, and the Moroccan artist-painter, Mohamed El Baz. Added to this are the members of the Critics’ jury, chaired by the Egyptian writer and critic, Amal El Gamal, and composed of the Moroccan researcher and screenwriter, Laila Charadi, a specialist in North African cinema, the Moroccan writer and critic, Adel Sammar, and the vice-president of the Association of Screenwriters of Andalusia, Miguel Angel Parra.

As for film screenings, festival-goers were able to discover, during this opening evening, the French feature film “Another world” by Stéphane Brizé which features a business executive, his wife and his family. , at a time when the professional choices of one are changing the lives of all. Philippe Lemesle and his wife separate, a love damaged by the pressure of work. A successful executive in an industrial group, Philippe no longer knows how to respond to the incoherent injunctions of his management. We wanted him to be a leader yesterday, today we want him to be an executor. He is at the moment when he has to decide on the meaning of his life.

After “The law of the market” and “At war”, Stéphane Brizé therefore continues his unvarnished radiography of the world of work. With, this time, this portrait of an executive subjected to the implacable direction of a conglomerate in full cleaning of its workforce. Economic brutality, humanity of the employees trampled on the ground, the film is rough from the formwork, always carried by the staging with the line of Brizé and the inhabited incarnation of Vincent Lindon.

Finally, let’s remember that the educational program of this 27th edition of the FCMT is placed under the theme “Image education”, and is part of the continuity of the major project of education in cinema, initiated by the Festival for many years. and to which particular attention is paid.

The festival therefore continues its openness to primary, secondary and university educational establishments, and accompanies the education reform project, through the promotion of the culture of the image and cinema as a means of disseminating knowledge and universal human values. During the festival, a series of workshops, training and courses on cinema will be organized for the benefit of students from several establishments in the city of Tetouan, particularly those in rural areas.

TODAY: Mehdi Ouassat