On 7 December 2024, pianist and composer Omar Harfouch performed his Concerto for Peace at Dubai Opera, one of the region's most prestigious stages. The evening was dedicated to a single idea that has guided his work for years: that music is a universal language capable of reaching across every divide.
The programme placed the Concerto for Peace — an original composition for piano and philharmonic orchestra — alongside other works from Harfouch's repertoire, performed with a full symphony orchestra. The seventeen-minute concerto, which he composed and co-orchestrated with his childhood friend Houtaf Khoury, anchored a night built around the theme of peace.
The performance was joined by Orlando Bloom, UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador, whose presence underscored the humanitarian message at the heart of the project. The evening also featured a surprise appearance by Chico & The Gypsies, the ensemble named UNESCO Special Envoy for Peace, bridging classical and popular traditions in a shared celebration of unity.
For Harfouch — born in Tripoli, Lebanon, and shaped as a young pianist by his country's civil war — the Dubai Opera concert continued a journey that has carried the Concerto for Peace from Europe's great halls to institutional stages and conflict-touched regions. "Music is the only language that doesn't need translation," he has said of the work.
The Dubai Opera performance reaffirmed the Concerto for Peace not merely as a musical composition, but as an ongoing mission — one that uses the concert stage to plead, quietly and persistently, for reason, fraternity, and peace.
“The concerto is no longer only a musical work. It has become a mission.”
