Around the Music Festival

The Paris Olympics came to a close on August 11. The closing ceremony was held at 9:00 p.m. and featured Zahia Ziouani, the model for the film “Divertimento,” and the Divertimento Symphony Orchestra. They performed the French national anthem “La Marseillaise” arranged by Victor Le Massenet, as well as a new piece “Records” in honor of the athletes.

Ziouani is 46 years old and was born in Paris. She was introduced to classical music at an early age by her Algerian parents, and her twin sister, Fettouma, is a professional cellist. Zahia herself studied at the Lycée Racine Conservatory and majored in music analysis, orchestration, and musicology at the Sorbonne. He studied under the famous conductor Sergiu Celibidache after attending a master class in Paris.

She founded Divertimento Symphony Orchestra in 1998. The story leading up to its founding was made into a film titled “Divertimento,” which was released in 2023 and attracted much attention.

She has been the music director since its inception and has been the first guest conductor of the National Symphony Orchestra of Algeria since 2007. She was also responsible for carrying the torch to the “Stade de France,” the venue of the closing ceremony, as one of the runners in this Olympic Games.

French tenor Benjamin Bernheim also appeared from the classical music world at the closing ceremony, which was attended by a crowd of 71,500 people. He was accompanied by Alain Roche, known for his performance with a piano suspended in the air, singing an arranged version of Faure’s “Hymn to Apollo,” composed for the first Olympic Games in 1893.

PHOTO：Zahia Ziouani