Middle Eastern concert

Dear Editor:Mr. Henry Veneracion's article about the Middle Eastern music event for Saturday, Feb. 22, at the Downey Theater gave me respect and pride for our city. ("Middle Eastern Orchestra Calls Downey Home," 2/13/14) Only great cities are mentally open to respect, welcome and show interest for other cultures and civilizations. The term "Middle Eastern music" usually means it comes from Egypti and, to some extent, Labanon. Egyptian music is very famous and enjoyed by many countries, especially in Europe. I traveled to Europe many times and in the restaurants, big department stores and theaters they play the music that makes you have certain feelings suitable to where you are. Often people ask about the music they heard. Mr. Wahab, whose music they will play Saturday, is a famous Egyptian, a great composer of the 20th century. He composed the classic music that makes you feel the word of the song even if you do not understand the language. An example that we know is the song at the end of the "Titanic" movie that Celine Dion sang -- you can feel from the music that it is a love song that also has sorrow or loss, even if you can not hear or understand the words. We cannot imagine any famous museum -- the Louvre, the Berlin, or the Metropolitan Museum of New York -- without the Egyptian section that forms more than 50 percent of the museum value. I feel it is very important to have our city hosting such international events because it makes us understand, appreciate, admire and respect other nations and their civilizations. When we do that we are more civilized human beings that understand that the loving God created humans equal and they are valuable and deserve to live in peace as we do. If our governments, presidents and policy makers are educated and wise enough to get this message, we woulld not have entered many wars and encouraged other wars so that we can sell weapons and the outcome is destruction of countries and human beings. I believe that these people who abuse their power will still answer to God one day. Shahira A-Malek, MD Downey

********** Published: Feb. 20, 2014 - Volume 12 - Issue 45