Echoes of the Sacred: Diverse Musical Worlds Converge at Jnan Sbil

Morocco World

22-05-2025

Fez – At the heart of the Fez World Sacred Music Festival's 28th edition, the tranquil gardens of Jnan Sbil became the stage for a powerful evening of musical devotion.
From the mystical traditions of Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan to the refined harmonies of Renaissance Europe and the ecstatic rhythms of Morocco's own Aissawa, each performance depicted a distinct path to the divine.
Mugham of Azerbaijan: a prayer in melody
As the sun dipped behind the city walls, Sahib Pashazade took his place with the tar resting gently against his chest, joined by Kamran Kerimov and the deep pulse of the nagara. What followed was not merely a concert, it was a ceremony.
Mugham, often called 'music sent by God,' carries centuries of spiritual weight. Its roots lie in ancient oral traditions, shaped by Quranic recitations and even older hymns.
The duo performed with a quiet intensity, each note of the tar threading through the night like sacred poetry, while the nagara offered grounding, heartbeat-like rhythms.
As the music rose and fell, the audience fell silent, almost in collective meditation.
Kazakh Bards: voices of the Steppe and the spirit
When Ulzhan Baibussynova stood before the crowd with her dombra in hand, a different kind of sacred space emerged. It was shaped by wind, vastness, and ancestral memory.
A respected zhyrau and one of the few women to practice this tradition, Baibussynova brought a rare voice to Fez, earthy, commanding, deeply human.
With Aigerim Shuster weaving deep tones from the kobyz and delicate lines from the zhetygen, the trio summoned the spirit of the Kazakh steppe. The music carried stories of warriors, of poets, of the sacred bond between nomads and nature. The guttural timbre of the vocals seemed to speak across time, calling the spirits of the aruakh into the present.
'This festival holds special significance as a global platform for sacred music traditions,' Baibussynova told Morocco World News (MWN). 'For Kazakh people, our musical heritage is sacred – it's how we preserve our history and connect generations.'
The award-winning performer, who began her musical training at just three years old, specializes in khoomei (throat singing) and the two-stringed dombra lute – both recognized by UNESCO as Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity.
'These arts were passed to me through the ustaz-shakirt tradition, the sacred bond between master and apprentice,' she explained. 'Tonight I performed an ancient epic song exactly as my teachers taught me – with the dombra's strings and the voice's resonance creating one spirit.'
Zenaida: renaissance reverence with a modern soul
Later in the evening, the ethereal voices of Zenaida, a young ensemble born at the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, rose into the Moroccan sky. Their journey through Renaissance polyphony brought a quiet, transcendent beauty to the stage.
Pieces by Josquin Desprez, Pierre de la Rue, and anonymous composers unfolded with care and emotional depth. In Plaine de deul , mourning found a fragile dignity. In Gaude virgo , light seemed to pour through invisible stained glass.
What made their presence remarkable was not just technical mastery but a genuine reverence. These young musicians, drawn from across the globe, offered more than historical re-creation, they brought the sacred to life.
Aissawa: a joyful ascent
The final performance ignited the crowd as night deepened. A local Aissawa troupe, clad in white and green, filled Jnan Sbil with a wave of Sufi energy.
The drums struck with thunderous clarity. The flutes and chants rose together in hypnotic layers. This was sacred music not meant for contemplation but for communal elevation. Dancers moved with ecstatic devotion, and some in the audience joined, swept by rhythm and fervor.
Where the earlier performances invited inward reflection, the Aissawa called for union, body, soul, and spirit, in collective celebration. The night ended not in silence, but in joyful noise.
A night of many paths, one sacred thread
In bringing together ancient traditions from across continents, the Fez World Sacred Music Festival reminded its audience of something deeply human: that music can be a temple, a prayer, a bridge.
Whether whispered in mugham, carried on the winds of the Kazakh steppe, sung in Renaissance Latin, or shouted in Sufi exaltation, each voice gave a truth – sacred, timeless, and shared. Tags: Fez World Sacred Music Festivalsacred musicSufi musicSufi tradition