RADIO SALAAM SHALOM HAS EXCLUSIVELY COMMISSIONED A SONG TO DELIVER A GLOBAL MESSAGE FOR HOLOCAUST MEMORIAL DAY 2010.

‘Pages of Hope’ is the work of an international musical trio with close links to Bristol. It features the rap lyrics of  Lines of Faith‘s Danny Raphael and Mohammed Yahya, coupled with powerful contributions from Canadian singer songwriter Dawud Wharnsby.

CLICK ON THIS PICTURE TO HEAR PAGES OF HOPE

The HMD theme this year was  ‘Legacy of Hope’ – a perfect fit with the song title and with the reality of pages in the teenager’s famous diary.  Tel Aviv-based Jewish rapper Danny Raphael sings the voice of Anne while Mozambican Muslim Mohammed Yahya responds with the voice of someone alive in today’s world. Dawud Wharnsby’s melodic and infectious chorus focuses on the fragility of the separation for those in the tiny hidden rooms in Amsterdam during World War 2.  This was where Anne Frank and seven other people hid for two and half years before being found and sent to their deaths in Nazi concentration camps.

This project was developed in Bristol by Salaam Shalom after visitors to last year’s “Anne Frank [+ you}” exhibition at Bristol Cathedral were asked to write their thoughts on leaves which they attached to the exhibit’s ‘Hope Tree’. Sone of these words were then incorporated by the musicians into their lyrics.

“We commissioned the song as a reminder that we have the power within us all to turn the page, to move on from tragedy into a more positive place.  It is an absolute pleasure to work with these talented artists from the Muslim and Jewish communities around the world, and to share their work with everyone as we approached Radio Salaam Shalom’s Third Anniversary” (Radio Salaam Shalom Station Manager, Kyle Hannan)

A special voice-only version of the track will be made available for intercultural music collectives around the world to remix. These are to be included on an album of Muslim-Jewish music for release under the JAMS  (Jewish and Muslim Sessions)  label  later this year on the anniversary of Anne’s Frank’s birth.

Radio Salaam Shalom would like to thank everyone who’s provided support for this amazing project, including Rolls Royce PLC, the Pierian Centre, Bamjimba Productions and a faith project grant from the Department of Communities and Local Government.

GET BEHIND OUR MICROPHONE.

Radio Salaam Shalom have been releasing a new downloadable programme (podcast) every fortnight for the last year. Now that many of our regular presenters have now moved away from Bristol or the UK, we’d like to put together some new presenting teams for the new year.

We’re after two or three teams of Muslim and Jewish co-presenters. Each set of co-hosts would record a show twice a month so all they’d need to spare is two or three hours once a fortnight.

If you’re over 18 and from the local Jewish or Muslim communities, get in touch. As long as you’ve got some  good ideas and a functioning voicebox, no previous experience is necessary. All the rest will fall into place (training etc if you need it).

This would naturally include any past or current presenters who’d like to put themselves onto the new roster for 2010.

To be part of our presenting team for 2010, simply email show@salaamshalom.org.uk) as soon as you can.

This is an unpaid, voluntary role. All new members will be required to read, understand and support the aims and objectives of Salaam Shalom (find them here).

RADIO SALAAM SHALOM RECENTLY MADE ITS FIRST LIVE BROADCAST FROM MAINLAND EUROPE

Presenters Carolyn Clitheroe and Danyal Laskar joined Jewish and Muslim participants from across Europe in a special live webcast from Brussels. It was the venue for a CEJI Seminar on Confronting Antisemitism and Islamophobia Through Media Literacy.

Jewish and Muslim youth leaders  aged 18 – 35 worked with new training manuals addressing Antisemitism and Islamophobia developed by CEJI’s Religious Diversity education team together with the Jewish Muslim Cooperation Platform and EPTO (European Peer Trainers Organisation).

This seminar addressed antisemitism and islamophobia through media literacy as participants learned to confront antisemitism and islamophobia in the media, develop critical thinking skills to analyse the media and develop skills and techniques to develop their own media tools. At the end of the seminar, they worked with Radio Salaam Shalom’s team to produce a special internet broadcast to showcase the results of their time together.

The seminar has the generous support of the European Youth Foundation of the Council of Europe.

[podcast]http://www.salaamshalom.org.uk/wp-content/media/RSSpodcast27.mp3[/podcast]

75 year- old Alica Shapira recently visited Bristol from Israel and was invited to visit the studios of Radio Salaam Shalom. In this ‘enhanced’ interview, listen as she tells us about life in Casablanca in the late thirties and forties through the eyes of a Jewish child.

Alica Shapira’s story portrays the ties of Muslim and Jewish culture reflected through custom, music, food and other aspects of daily life.

In Casablanca Alica Edri (her maiden name) lived a life of poverty whithin the walls of the Medina. She, her mother and father, brothers and sisters occupied one damp, dark room. Money was scarce and food was in short supply. At the age of six Alica began working to bring money home, but later conditions improved when she was employed as a live-in seamestress. In her new settings she spoke French, learnt a new trade, made new friends, and  discovered the world of cinema… In 1951 she immigrated to Israel to begin her new life as an Israeli citizen. For the last 58 years, as a member of 3 different Kibbutzim in Israel, in a world apart from everything she new in Morocco, Alice never forgot her roots. Right photo: A new Israeli citizen These days, the Jewish Moroccan community is of a momentous significance in the Israeli society, but in the early 50′s in a Kibbutz in Israel, Alica found herself to be one of the only “sephardi” (Eastern Jew) in an Ashkenazi (European Jew) community. Brought up in an Arab culture until she was sixteen Alica was to discover that her “ways” were quite different from those of the other members of the kibbutz who predominantly originated from Europe. With the years, Alica integrated well into her new environment, but images of the streets of her childhood in Casablanca have never left her….

LISTEN TO THIS PODCAST HERE:

WE TALK TO RON PROSOR, ISRAEL’S AMBASSADOR TO THE  UNITED KINGDOM.

In the latest of our “Inclusive Exclusive” features, four of our Jewish and Muslim team were given an exclusive opportunity to spend time with a high-profile personality whose work puts him on the Jewish/Muslim radar.

Ambassador Prosor was in Bristol for a public speaking engagement with Bristol University’s International Affairs Society. (More on that here).

Listen to our inclusive team’s conversation with the Ambassador as we shared some exclusive time together in a (very noisy) city centre hotel conference room.

[podcast]http://www.salaamshalom.org.uk/wp-content/media/podcast25.mp3[/podcast]