When Belgian foreign correspondent Rudi Vranckx reported on the liberation of Mosul last June, he met Nabeel Atraqchi. Nabeel’s music school had been destroyed completely during the occupation by Islamic State, who think playing music is sinful. Almost all musical instruments were destroyed, and the musicians were persecuted.
The injustice that journalists see is one hell of an occupational hazard to navigate. You could say it’s scarring, and you’d be correct. Back in Belgium, Rudi was not content to leave well enough alone. Instead, he collected all the instruments he could gather and shipped them to Mosul so that Nabeel could rebuild his music school. The campaign was dubbed “Imagine Mosul,” after John Lennon’s famous song.
The campaign now continues as “Imagine Home.” Created with the help of Belgian advertising agency mortierbrigade, in collaboration with sound studio RayGun, Imagine Home is raising money in order to give young refugees the chance to practice music.
On imaginehome.canvas.be you can find the partition of a track composed by Belgian composer Peter Baert and performed by young refugees in Belgium in collaboration with musicians in Mosul. As soon as you pick a note and buy it, you can listen to it. The more donations, the more the composition will reveal itself.
