Arts 2019, 8, 14 7 of 16 2.2. From Song Compilation to Stage Performance The band was quickly asked to give performances30 , and musicians were enthusiastic to play some more concerts together. For technical and financial reasons, the band had to be reduced to ten musicians:31 the choices, made in a logic of scenic production, focused on the variety of profiles and repertoires, on the musicians’ ability to play together as well as on their desire to get involved in a long-term professional project in Belgium. While the band included musicians of various nationalities, several requests concerned a “band of Syrians” in relation to recent arrivals of refugees in the country.32 Muziekpublique also faced unusual demands. Many music festivals oriented towards “world music”33 wanted to feature Refugees for Refugees, whose musical repertoire is rather to be included in the category of “traditional music”34 . I usually don’t feel that our project is different from the others, because we play in the same places than the other Muziekpublique’s projects. But sometimes there have been festivals where, when I saw the other bands, I wondered if they had invited us just for the name of our band, because you feel that the music in these festivals is not the same as ours”,35 says Tammam Ramadan. Other types of solicitations came from more official institutions. The presence of Refugees for Refugees was intensely desired but little valued in practice; for instance, the band was sometimes used as background music during a buffet.36 When the band was awarded the Culture Price by the Flemish Commission, it was proposed to take part in the ceremony and play some 15-s jingles before the announcement of each laureate, behind a curtain. After negotiations, the band also played two whole songs in front of the audience. Many requests from the volunteer sector concerned events intended for their users, often refugees, to show them that some refugees have “successful” trajectories, willing to share with them positive stories as well as the opportunity to spend a festive moment with familiar music. The wage proposed to artists was often very low: while Refugees for Refugees tended to integrate musicians professionally, the fact that they needed to be paid decently to pursue their life project did not always seem to be a main concern for those who wanted to book them for a show. In the end, the variety in the proposals was not necessarily perceived positively by Peter Van Rompaey: We are of course happy that the project works. [ . . . ] But we have the feeling that for this project, it is the theme that attracts. As it is in the news, the programmers jump on it without 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 Even before the CD was released, the band was invited by the Music Meeting (Nijmegen, NL), Festival de Wallonie (Villers-la-Ville, BE), Espéranzah! (Floreffe, BE), Festival Les Suds (Arles, FR), Festival d’Art de Huy (BE) and Les Rencontres Inattendues (Tournai, BE). At its beginning, the band was gathering Ali Shaker Hassan (qānūn), Aman Yusufi (dambura and vocals), Asad Qizilbash (sarod and violin), Dolma Renqingi (vocals and choreography), Kelsang Hula (dramyen and vocals), Khaled al-Hafez (vocals and daf ), Simon Leleux (darbūka), Tammam Ramadan (nāy), Tareq al-Sayed Yahya (‘ūd) and Tristan Driessens (‘ūd). Today, Souhad Najem (qānūn) has replaced Ali Shaker and Fakher Madallal (vocals) has replaced Khaled. Since 2015, the main nationalities of asylum seekers have changed: while Syrians still arrive in large numbers in Belgium, new migrant groups are now mainly made of Eritreans and Sudanese people. In French as well as in English, the “world music” label generates much confusion. Laurent Aubert (2011, p. 32) established three categories encompassed by this term: folklore music, world music and traditional music. According to him, the label “world music” refers to fusion repertoires: “experiences generated by the meeting of musicians from diverse backgrounds and by the integration of “exotic” instruments and sounds into the electronic equipment of current Western music production” (Aubert 2011, p. 33, our translation). Music with an acoustic aesthetic, oriented towards the act of listening and often perceived by Western audiences as “authentic”, unlike world music, which fully assumes an aesthetic of hybridity (Aubert 2011, p. 33). Interview with Tammam Ramadan, Brussels, 30 August 2018 [our translation]. This made the Aleppo musicians particularly angry: they refused to play their Sufi repertoire in front of an audience drinking alcohol that was not even listening to them.