The first “International Conference on Azmari”, the traditional poet-singers from highland Ethiopia will be held at the Center for World Music from January 6 to 8 2012. The Center for World Music is part of the University of Hildesheim in northern Germany.
Specialists from a number of countries who are all working on different aspects of the Azmaris will participate in the conference, which has the motto From Ambivalence to Acceptance.
The aim of this conference is to bring scholars and experts together, who are working in the fields of music, anthropology, history, language and literature, sociology, arts, film, musical productions and recordings, etc., in order to discuss and debate the poetic and musical contributions of the Azmari in the lives of the Ethiopian society from various perspectives.
(For more information see the website of the conference.)
The participants come from different European countries and the US. But the biggest group are researchers from Ethiopia who teach and work at different universities.
While the main program consists of scientific presentations there will also be a film panel with a number of films on Azmaris. And, two Azmaris will also take part and present their art and discuss with the participants of the conference.
The conference is organized by a team of individual researchers from the universities of Hildesheim, Hamburg and Berlin (me).