# Trumpeter Ibrahim Maalouf: ‘People are afraid of multiculturalism’: Video Photos

- Link: https://jazzblues.eu/2021/08/06/trumpeter-ibrahim-maalouf-people-are-afraid-of-multiculturalism-video-photos/
- Published: 2021-08-06T23:37:42+01:00
- Author: https://JazzBlues.EU

**Shifting between genres, French-Lebanese trumpeter Ibrahim Maalouf has become 
one of the most popular European instrumentalists worldwide at the age of 41. He
will make his Belgian return on Thursday evening in Arena 5 in Brussels.**

Ibrahim Maalouf ended up in Paris as a child when he fled Beirut with his parents
in the 1980s from the violence of war. In the French capital he perfected his trumpet
playing with his father, who himself had once traveled to the city of lights to 
pursue his musical dream.

‘It is impossible to understand my path without knowing my father’s,’ says Maalouf.
He released ’40 melodies’ last year. He then returns to the foundation of his music:
the melodies that he played together with his father as a little boy.

‘My father Nassim boarded a boat to France in the 1960s, without money and without
speaking the language. But he did have a dream: one day to study the trumpet at 
the Paris Conservatory. At 21 he had fallen in love with the instrument. That dream
seemed out of reach for an illiterate person who dropped out of school at nine because
my grandparents couldn’t afford it.’

‘Yet little by little he has succeeded in making his dream come true, initially 
thanks to his teacher, the French trumpet legend Maurice André. Later on, my father
revolutionized the trumpet by adding a fourth valve together with a Parisian instrument
builder, so that he could play the often somewhat mystical sounding Arabic quarter
tones and compose oriental classical music.’

Without that fourth valve, Maalouf would never have started trumpeting, he readily
admits. ‘With that extra valve I could play both powerfully and softly, bringing
music from my Lebanese and Arabic culture as well as from France. This allowed me
to accompany chansonniers such as Georges Moustaki and Vincent Delerm, but also 
to interpret jazz, blues, rock and even hard rock. I thought it was magical that
one instrument could be such an engine of creativity and connection.’

My father was strict in classical teaching and told me I was wrong if I wanted to
mix classical or Arabic melodies with other genres again. But it was my way. Later
he would be at peace with it.’

The open mind with which Maalouf seeks out cross-fertilization is also reflected
in ’40 mélodies’. This is the trumpeter’s twelfth studio album on which he adapted
pieces from his entire oeuvre – from his 2007 debut album ‘Diasporas’ over the numerous
soundtracks to his recent Latin foray ‘S3NS’ – into duets. He brings them together
with the Belgian guitarist François Deporte. The result sounds more intimate (and
sometimes even more nostalgic) than we are used to from him.

The double album was launched with a video in which the duo performs a corona-proof
version of the breakthrough track ‘Beirut’ in the empty amphitheater of Nîmes. You
can recognize the wide range of genres from which Maalouf draws inspiration from
the choice of guest musicians. Pop musician Sting, Indian percussionist Trilok Gurtu,
American jazz bassist Marcus Miller and the renowned Kronos Quartet, among others,
make their appearance.

Commuting between genres has never been a problem for Maalouf. ‘It is difficult 
to be recognized as a classical trumpeter with my Arabic background. At international
competitions I was always the odd guy with that extra valve.’

His origins also played tricks on him in the French jazz world. ‘Until today I experience
the consequences of a certain artistic fascism, while jazz stands for freedom for
me.’ Maalouf found the explanation of this contradiction in the book ‘Les identités
meurtrières’ – translated as ‘Murderous Identities’ – by his uncle, the journalist
and writer Amin Maalouf. ‘Fragile cultures that fear disappearing often do the exact
opposite of what they should do to survive. Instead of becoming an open house and
continuing to evolve, they will shield themselves from the outside world for fear
that their place will be taken.’

![Stream Ibrahim Maalouf - Beirut by guszti | Listen online for free on  SoundCloud](
https://i0.wp.com/i1.sndcdn.com/artworks-000023304258-v90ljy-t500x500.jpg?resize
=640%2C640&ssl=1)

**The other daddy**

Maalouf once had an animated but painful discussion about it with the American trumpeter
and composer Wynton Marsalis. ‘He’s my god, in jazz and on trumpet, in everything
really. But just before a joint concert in Marciac, he stunned me. I never pretended
to be a jazz man, but I love the genre and would love to belong to ‘the family’.
If he, as the daddy of jazz, acknowledged that, it would mean a lot to me too, I
told him.’

‘ But he explained to me that if I called my music jazz I would take his culture
away from him, as if jazz could only be the jazz of New Orleans and the black community.
To me, identity means something completely different. People are afraid of multiculturalism.
They think that if we mix colors, we wipe them out. But mixing colors has never 
suppressed an original culture. On the contrary. Isn’t it because you mix yellow
and blue and green is created that yellow and blue suddenly serve no purpose?’

![](https://images.tijd.be/view?iid=Elvis:EjMvGWOyKIDBnwKj3iQRL5&context=ONLINE&
ratio=16/9&width=640&u=1627318289000)

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