Gazino Arabesk

When there´s nothing left, there´s only solution: to celebrate defeat to the max! What else can one do in this city, which constantly pretends that anything goes and then turns a cold shoulder at any given moment? So at least make the most out of your trivial, humiliated, despicable and painful existence!

Arabesk, a Turkish music style expressing a quest for an Orient which is neither in Istanbul nor in Berlin, but in our hearts, shows us how. It is a mixture of Egyptian, Turkish and Western popular music with ornamental tunes and fatalistic lyrics, a way of living which is banal, corny, indecent und indecisive.
Gazino Arabesk succumbs to this way of living for one night. A tragic and passionate story unfolds between Orient and Occident, Istanbul and Berlin.
Five performers, entangled in love, passion, desire and pain, sing their hearts out in this theatrical soap opera. Among them are the wonderful sisters İdil (well known from the film Against the Wall) and İlke Üner, Berlins marvellous Queen of Rap and Soul Aziza A., the master of improvisation Tim Seyfi, and last but by no means least The Man Who Feels Blue, Laurens Walter, all of who suffer and cry under the musical direction of Turgay Ayaydınlı (Orientation, Aziza A. and others).
Life in the city and how to escape from it, the desire to belong, a longing for what does not exist, bleak realities and dreams make up this one of 1000 nights.
Gazino Arabesk follows up on the hugely successful music show Berlin Arabesk, which Shermin Langhoff produced at the HAU as part of Beyond Belonging ‒ Autoput Avrupa (2007).