With the “Teachers’ concert,” the ninth “Festival of Ayyar” opened in Jerusalem on Thursday 2 May. This is the annual appointment of the Magnificat Institute to promote the school of music of the Custody of the Holy Land. The institute, the activities of which started almost 30 years ago, thanks to the initiative of fra Armando Pierucci, today has an average of about 200 students per year and 25 teachers. Located in the heart of the Old City of Jerusalem, since 2005 it has been the seat abroad of the “Arrigo Pedrollo” Conservatoire of Vicenza (Italy). This agreement means that students can take certificates of the first and second academic level recognized all over the world.

The teachers take the stage

A number of teachers of the Magnificat alternated on the stage of the concert on Thursday 2 May and performed a highly variegated repertoire of classical music from the stylistic point of view. The teachers performed both as soloists and in duets. Music from the piano, the violin, the cello and the violoncello, saxophone filled the room, for the pleasure of the large audience. Some representatives of the diplomatic corps, including the Italian and Spanish Consuls, were present.

A homecoming

Annie Aslanian was born and grew up in Jerusalem and began her music studies at the Magnificat when she was eight years old. She then graduated from and was awarded a master’s degree by the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance (JAMD) and from this year has returned as a teacher of piano in the classrooms where she herself had been a young pupil. “This has always been a home for me. I like to see the smaller children learning new things, getting better and reaching results.” After the outbreak of the war, she continued welcoming her students trying to give them quality time: “We do not speak about the war, we make music. Everything around us is political, but music is a universal language, which goes beyond all that.”

Beyond the differences

After his childhood and piano lessons in Moscow, Daniel Sinchuk arrived with his family in Israel and discovered his passion, the saxophone.  At the moment he mainly teaches at the Conservatoire of the Tsor’a Kibbutz. He came to the Magnificat through a colleague and has been on the teaching staff since this year. He has four students of sax and gives lessons twice a week. “I have heard a lot about this place: it is very interesting, unique, I would say, and I like teaching here. There is a professional atmosphere and a cordial climate.” Professor Sinchuk is an Israeli Jew and his students at the Magnificat are all Arabs: “This is absolutely not a problem and it is also a very important experience for the kids. I do not think that my students or their families are different from me; it doesn’t matter to me whether they are Jewish, Arabs or Christians… I do not believe it is discriminating.”

May in music

Ayyar is the month of “May”. Every Thursday, the Magnificat Institute proposes a concert in which the teachers and the students of the more advanced courses perform. This year, the last appointment will be a performance by the smallest pupils. The first two concerts (2 and 9 May) will be held in the Immaculate Conception Auditorium, in the St Saviour complex; on 16 May the venue will be the Anglican cathedral of St George, on 23 May, the concert will be hosted in the church of Notre Dame, while the last concert, on 30 May, will be in the open, in the cloister of St Elena of the Franciscan convent of St. Savior.