Mission to Baghdad The Iraqi National Symphony Orchestra starts its slow-but-steady efforts to rebuild by Allegra Klein

Dear Reader,

We left Amman, Jordan, at midnight on a cool November evening, and nearly five hours later drove into Iraq, as the early morning sun rose over the golden desert. I had finally arrived in this awe-inspiring land known as "the cradle of civilization." We'd heard that the next five hours on the highway to Baghdad would be plagued with bandits and rebels. Fortunately, we did not encounter any, though we did pass several military convoys manned by machine-gun–toting American soldiers, who glared into our car as we drove by.

The city of Baghdad was vibrant and beautiful, in spite of burnt-out buildings and immense concrete barriers erected around American-occupied buildings and hotels after the recent war. Traffic was chaotic, due to broken street lights and frequent blackouts, and most cars looked old and battered for a lack of spare parts—a by-product of the UN trade sanctions endured by the Iraqi people since 1990.

My excitement grew as we approached our destination, a small hotel in the relatively safe district of Karrada. We checked in to a modest but well-appointed apartment, which had a gas tank in the kitchen to light the stove. The owners were Christian, and in spite of the fact that I was traveling with someone who'd grown up in Baghdad, they kept a watchful eye on us Americans.

Two days earlier, I had flown into the Jordanian capital of Amman with a suitcase full of instruments, strings, and sheet music for the Iraqi National Symphony Orchestra (INSO) and the Music and Ballet School in Baghdad. The organization I represent—Musicians For Harmony, Inc., in New York City—had held a stateside concert in September to benefit them. Through this event, I met Wafaa' Al-Natheema, an Iraqi-American woman from Boston who organized our charitable mission, and together we traveled to Iraq.

A short time after the 9/11 attacks, a group of chamber musicians–including the Guarneri, Juilliard, and Shanghai quartets, and Musique Sans Frontières (Musicians Without Borders)–formed Musicians For Harmony as a way to help provide solace for those affected by the attacks while fostering peace through music. The INSO, under the auspices of the Institute for Near Eastern and African Studies, was one of two recipients of the nonprofit organization's fundraising efforts in 2003.

We spent our first evening in Baghdad in our room, as it was not advisable to go anywhere after dark. The hotel staff brought us dinner—a delicious local specialty of freshly caught, fire-grilled fish—and we watched programs from all over the Middle East on our satellite-TV hookup.

The next day, I awoke to the hauntingly beautiful strains of the call to prayer from the local mosque. After breakfast, we took a taxi to the home of one of the most senior and revered musicians in the INSO–the principal violist Munther Jamil Hafidh–to deliver our donations. Now 72 years old, he has been with the orchestra since its official inception in 1959.

Munther greeted us with a sparkle in his blue eyes and a teasing manner that reminded me of musicians I'd known my whole life. His studio was filled with instruments, including a majestic Steinway grand piano–a gift from Saddam Hussein to the famous Iraqi pianist Beatrice Ohanessian, who left it behind when she moved to the States after the first Gulf War. There were also books on art and music in both English and Arabic. Munther is also quite an accomplished painter and was working on a canvas displayed on an easel near his bookshelves.

The INSO's manager, Hisham Sharaf, arrived soon after, and we presented our gifts. Among them were a quarter- and a half-size violin that I had used as a child, as well as dozens of strings, pegs, bridge blanks, and sound posts. These would be used by the first ever (to my knowledge) Iraqi violin maker, Nabil Abd al-Salaam, who is also the orchestra's principal cellist. In fact, Nabil made an instrument during the war that was the subject of the short film The Rose Violin. Filmmaker Patrick Dillon brought the violin back to the United States after the war. It is now being displayed around the country.

In keeping with traditional Iraqi hospitality, Munther and his wife invited us to stay for lunch, and offered a lavish spread of local dishes–a few of which included the omnipresent date, of which (I was told) there are over 400 varieties in Iraq. Among the many visitors to Munther's house that afternoon was his nephew, a venerable professor of physical chemistry now living in London, who returned recently to help revitalize the university system in Iraq.

The next morning, Hisham took us to the Baghdad Convention Center, a compound within the so-called Green Zone that houses most of the major ministry buildings. It now also serves as a replacement for the concert hall, which was bombed during the war and subsequently looted.

On the way, we picked up the conductor, Mohammed Amin Ezzat—a soft-spoken, dignified man, who told me of his desire to obtain proper scores and parts for the INSO. Upon arriving, we walked along a narrow path lined on both sides with sandbag barricades and razor wire, and then passed through four security checks before gaining entrance. As we approached the auditorium (just down the hall from the room where US generals hold daily press briefings), I heard the familiar sound of a French horn player warming up for the rehearsal.

I was surprised to find that the concert hall was pitch black, but the musicians seemed used to this. As my eyes adjusted, I recognized a violinist named Bashar, whom I had met the day before at Munther's house. He was studying at the local university and graciously offered to lend me his instrument so I could participate in the rehearsal. As we were chatting, violinist Annie Melconian joined us. She was a dark-haired and bubbly young Armenian woman–a biologist by training who had lost her job during the war and now earned only her $120 a month from the orchestra (a significant increase from the $20 that musicians were paid each month under the Saddam regime, but still not enough to cover their monthly rent). Most of the musicians, as it turned out, had held other jobs but had also been let go because of the war.

In spite of this, Annie was upbeat and excited about the prospect of going to America with the orchestra for its December 9 appearance at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC. In its first foreign performance in 11 years, INSO would present a joint concert with the [American] National Symphony Orchestra.

Another violinist, named Adnan, came over and asked in broken English if I knew the Bach Double Concerto. After we played a few bars together, the lights suddenly went on and the musicians started to take their places. Hisham invited me to sit with the principal second violinist—Majid Al-Ghazali—and we began to rehearse.

What a wonderful feeling to play with the very same musicians whose plight I had been following for nearly a year. We started with "Morning" from Grieg's Peer Gynt Suite. I was worried I wouldn't understand Maestro Ezzat's directions, since I don't speak Arabic. But he called out the rehearsal letters in English, and the dynamics and tempos in Italian, so I felt right at home.

At the break, I returned my borrowed violin to Bashar. We were told that Ambassador L. Paul Bremer, the administrator of the Coalition Provisional Authority, was about to arrive and I noticed bomb-sniffing dogs checking every row of the 2,000-seat auditorium. Army personnel instructed the musicians to exit the hall, leaving their instruments behind for the dogs to inspect.

When we returned, I was delighted to hear Bremer announce that the Major Orchestra Librarians' Association had gathered music from orchestras throughout the United States for the INSO. He added, "All across Iraq, people are working hard to return the country to normal. You play a very important role in that mission."

We spent our third and final day in Baghdad at the Music and Ballet School, where many teachers are also members of the Iraqi Orchestra. Students range in age from kindergarten to high school, and there are classes in all subjects, not just music and dance.

A heavily armed guard greeted us at the door and we were then given a tour of the school. There was a piano in nearly every room, including in one room a very rare keethara—a "double piano" that features both a western-style and an Arabic quarter-tone keyboard.

Sadly, many of the school's furnishings and musical instruments were damaged in the war and subsequent looting. But seven pianos had already been repaired, and they are slowly replacing other instruments that were smashed or stolen, though the need is still great.

As we passed the schoolyard, children were playing games and chanting, "Long live Iraq!" while another armed guard stood nearby. We were shown buildings that had been occupied by American troops during the war and were badly burned. After seeing the conditions under which these children had to study, we hoped to find a way to continue helping them, even after we were gone.

I was truly sorry to leave this beautiful country and my new friends. However, after returning home, I was consoled by an email from Majid, who wrote: "You are a member of the INSO because you are a musician."

This would not have been possible without the universal language of music, which knows no ethnic, national, or religious boundaries.

Sincerely,

Allegra Klein