TEHRAN – Kurdish Iranian kamancheh virtuoso Kayhan Kalhor has composed and played a score for “Dance on Balloons”, a short film directed by Vahid Sheikhzadeh

The movie revolves around the Kurdish children living in Sarepole Zahab, a quake-stricken town in the western Iranian province of Kermanshah.

Normal life has not returned to Sarepole Zahab yet since 2017 after a devastating earthquake reduced the town to rubble.     

Kalhor has received no payment for his collaboration in “Dance on Balloons”, and he has expressed sympathy for the children by his partnership in this project, a public relations team of the movie said in a statement published on Sunday.

The world-renowned musician has always been responsive to issues involving the Kurdish people.

In October 2019, four-time Grammy Award nominee Kalhor canceled his concert in Istanbul, Turkey, in protest over the country’s assault on the Kurds in Syria.

“The violence and the war in Syria have caused a lot of grief for the Kurds and this catastrophe will cause heavy casualties and make many people homeless, but some politicians do not realize these issues,” he lamented.

“I was scheduled to perform a concert in Istanbul in the near future, but I canceled it in sympathy for my Kurdish brothers and sisters,” he noted. 

Kalhor has won several awards at Iranian and international music events. 

He won the Artist Award of the globalFEST, North America’s most important world music industry event, which was held in New York in January.

He won the Artist Award at the WOMEX Awards, the World Music Expo, in Finland in August 2019. 

He was also one of the two winners of the Isaac Stern Human Spirit Award at the Shanghai Isaac Stern International Violin Competition in August 2018.

Photo: Kurdish Iranian musician Kayhan Kalhor performs in an undated photo.

MMS/YAW