In the first of a new series of collaborations, DAC and Freight & Salvage Berkeley are proud to co-present Kinan Azmeh CityBand featuring vocalist Sepideh Vahidi for one night only.

Hailed as a “virtuoso” and "intensely soulful" by the New York Times and "spellbinding" by The New Yorker. Syrian-born, genre-bending composer and clarinetist Kinan Azmeh has been touring the globe with great acclaim as a soloist, composer and improviser in the most prestigious concert halls in the world such as Opera Bastille, the UN’s general assembly, der Philharmonie; Berlin; the Library of Congress, Hamburg’s Elbphilharmonie and the Damascus Opera House for its opening concert. He has collaborated with Daniel Barenboim, John McLaughlin, and Djivan Gasparian, among others and leads his own bands Hewar and Kinan Azmeh CityBand. He is a member of Yo-Yo Ma's Silkroad Ensemble with whom he won a Grammy in 2016. Visit Kinan's website for more information.

Born in Tehran, Sepideh Vahidi studied Persian folklore and traditional Persian music under some of the finest masters of this art. Weaving the transparent layers of many emotions into a sound that could not be defined by the name of a land with borders became her tradition. However Sepideh’s vocals have deep roots in her Iranian identity, femininity, and very much influenced by Persian poetry. Living in America, Sepideh studied Fine Arts, once again using layers as her primary tool. Both in her vocals and her artworks, she folds and unfolds, twist and turns notes to express the happiness, pain, love, grief, hope, nostalgia, and memories that haunt her in life. Visit Sepideh's website for more information.