Exclusive: Choral singers quit Qatar
NewsNot long ago, there was this announcement:
The Planning Committee for the 2023 World Symposium on Choral Music (WSCM) is delighted to announce the patronage by the State of Qatar’s Ministry of Culture and Sports for the 2023 WSCM. The WSCM is to be held in Doha, Qatar, 30 December 2023 to 5 January 2024.
Today we learn:
We are happy to announce that the World Symposium on Choral Music (WSCM), one of the biggest events of the International Federation for Choral Music, will be held in Turkey from 25th to 30th of April 2023 with the support of the Turkish Ministry of Culture and Tourism. The event will be organized by the Turkish representative of IFCM, the Choral Culture Association.
Apparently there was a backlash by IFCM grass roots members and a split in the IFCM management team over Qatar’s social politics.
pictured: Qatar Philharmonic.
Guess that rainbow choirs were not going to spring up in the desert.
Are the social policies any better in Turkey?
Gay sexual conduct between consenting adults in private is not a crime in Turkey. In Qatar it carries a three year prison sentence (for Muslims theoretically the death penalty).
But surely the point is that changing the symposium venue sends a bad signal. Citing lack of funding by the Qatari choral association I find hard to swallow.
Yes a cursory look at Turkeys human rights record on the Amnesty site will give you a picture you wouldn’t want hung in your own home.
I did reply, but my post seems not to have made it to this thread.
Next time, hold it in Dubai. We have a thriving choral scene here, and a tolerant and welcoming government. A few years ago the Pope held an open air mass for 150,000 people in Abu Dhabi!
Thats not actually the case at all with what happened, but oh well, at least the symposium will go ahead anyway.
The IFCM asks us to believe this:
“The Qatar National Choral Association (QNCA) has had to withdraw from organising the WSCM in Qatar due to the lack of financial sustainability.”
Really? And anyway, was do the weasel words “financial sustainability” actually mean?