Muskegon, Michigan, November 5, 2018—The “extraordinarily sensitive guitar-duo” of Goran Ivanovic and Fareed Haque will perform at The Block in downtown Muskegon at 7:30pm Saturday, November 17. Inspired by the rhythms and melodies of flamenco, jazz, classical, rock and the Balkan region, the duo are widely regarded as among the finest players of their respective generations. Their music is carefully balanced between blazing virtuosity and sheer beauty.
Ivanovic and Haque have both the musicality and the cultural history to merge cross-cultural genres into one kaleidoscopic whole. Haque is part Pakistani and part Chilean, spending much of his formative life in Spain, Iran, France, Pakistan and Chile. Ivanovic is from war-torn Croatia and studied classical music in Salzburg, Australia. Their compositions draw from Macedonian folk songs and pay homage to Brazilian composer Heitor Villa-Lobos.
Goran Ivanovic was studying at the prestigious Mozarteum University in Salzburg in the late ‘90s when his parents were expelled from his native Croatia. (His father is a Serb and his mother a Bosnian Croat.) Granted asylum in the US, the family settled in Chicago. Since his arrival, Ivanovic has displayed a deep interest in collaboration, steadily expanding his stylistic range beyond his Balkan roots and the European classical music of his early training. His repertoire today incorporates but transcends those disciplines, ranging into jazz, flamenco and beyond.
Fareed Haque is a modern guitar virtuoso also steeped in classical and jazz traditions. Born in 1963 to a Pakistani father and Chilean mother, Haque has worked with Paquito D’Rivera, Sting, Herbie Mann, Bob James, Tony Monaco and David Sanborn, among others, and was invited by Sting to join his record label Pangaea. He has been featured on WTTW’s ArtBeat and Chicago Tonight, and has twice been selected as Talent Deserving Wider Recognition in Downbeat Magazine. He has been a visiting artist at Western Michigan University and, since 1989, professor of jazz and classical guitar at Northern Illinois University.
Single tickets are priced at $25, $10 for students with ID. To order, call 231.726.3231 or visit www.TheBlockWestMichigan.org.