Iran's Supreme Leader Likes Jazz
Sunday June 21, 2009
I was very surprised to learn in this June 20th Washington Post article that the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei "favors jazz." This is the same Supreme Leader who consistently opposes the U.S. and the West in general.
Khamenei spurred the closing of music schools across Iran in 1996 with a fatwa that banned music education, claiming that the promotion of music in schools is contrary to the teachings of Islam. A spokesperson in a 2000 interview stated, "It is not permissible to teach beguiling music which is suitable for trifling and immoral gatherings." Immoral gatherings are the reason most people I know got into jazz in the first place!
I wonder if he listens to jazz on an ipod, and who he considers to be less beguiling: Louis Armstrong or Bix Beiderbeck? Maybe he's a fan of late Coltrane.
Image © Majid / Getty Images
hehe Really a Cool Old Thing….
Hey,,,A cool old thing ….
By the way, d’u know that there is a jazz bend in Iran whose songs are based on the words of Omar Khayam(a poet of 12th century)…I think it’s cool….Quite lately they have had a concert in our country ARMENIA…YEREVAN
once Monk has said that jazz and freedom go hand in hand. and being a Moslem, one should freed himself from any un-Divine rules; the jazz music provide these…
my darker side suggests he likes Kenny G.