RAVENNA: Nine musicians from the Syrian diaspora in Europe are playing Sunday in the 24th friendship concert conducted by Riccardo Muti, this year at the Paestum archaeological site in southern Italy, but the coronavirus pandemic blocked others from arriving directly from Syria.
The concert Sunday by the Luigi Cherubini Youth Orchestra founded by Muti, part of the Ravenna Festival summer series, is dedicated to Syrian archaeologist Khaled Al-Asaad and Kurdish-Syrian politician Hevreen Khalaf, both of whom were slain during Syria’s ongoing civil war.
“These concerts give to Ravenna the possibility to be an important ambassador of peace and brotherhood from Italy,” Muti told The Associated Press earlier this month in Ravenna. Khalaf was killed by Syrian fighters trained by Turkey 2019, and Al-Asaad was beheaded in 2015 by fighters of the Daesh group after he refused to aid their destruction of the ancient Roman city at Palmyra, a UN world heritage site.
Muti launched the Roads of Friendship concert series in 1997 in Sarajevo, shortly after Bosnia’s 1992-1995 civil war ended, and has since traveled to cities wounded by war, including Beirut, as well as in ancient and historic sites to “reestablish ties” with places that have made history, including the ancient Roman amphitheater in the southern Syrian city of Bosra.
“We can build bridges between civilizations, between people, with music,” said Karoun Baghboudarian, a cellist living in the Netherlands who is playing in Sunday’s concert and who sang in the chorus during the 2004 concert in Bosra — before Syria devolved into war, a period when she said musicians’ lives flourished.
Her brother, Missak Baghboudarian, conducts the Syrian National Symphony Orchestra and had hoped to travel to Italy to conduct a concert in Ravenna and attend the Paestum concert of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 3, known as the “Heroic,” but was unable to travel because of travel restrictions imposed by the coronavirus. Instead, the Syrian National Symphony Orchestra streamed Beethoven’s “Heroic” from Damascus on July 2.
Karoun Baghboudarian said she hoped the concert would renew attention on Syrians’ suffering.
“We hope that Syria will come through the war and all the difficult situations as heroes, and that they can live normally,” she said by phone from Paestum.
Muti conducts Syria musicians in memorial concert amid ruins
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Muti conducts Syria musicians in memorial concert amid ruins
- Nine Syrian musicians in Europe are playing in the 24th friendship concert conducted by Riccardo Muti
Lindsay Lohan steps out in Dubai
DUBAI: Dubai-based Hollywood star Lindsay Lohan was spotted in the city this week alongside her husband, Kuwaiti financier Bader Shammas, as the couple stepped out in coordinated black looks.
Lohan was wearing a sleek black long-sleeved mini dress with a high neckline and softly draped silhouette, featuring gathered ruching across the skirt with a tie detail at the waist. She paired the look with pointed black heels and kept her accessories minimal, opting for delicate earrings and a statement ring from Italian fine jewelry label Bijouq.
The couple were attending the opening of Japanese restaurant Nobu’s new outpost at One Za’abeel.
Lohan has been based in Dubai for more than 10 years, where she has built a quieter, more private life away from Hollywood.
She married Shammas in 2022, and the couple welcomed their first child, a son named Luai, in 2023.
The actress has since continued to balance family life in the UAE with her acting career, including her recent return to film and television projects.
Lohan most recently starred in “Freakier Friday,” the Disney sequel to “Freaky Friday,” which was released in August 2025 and marked her return to theatrical film acting alongside Jamie Lee Curtis.
It follows another body-swap chaos — this time across generations. Lohan and Lee Curtis return as Anna and Tess, but the story expands to include Anna’s own daughter, creating a multi-generational switch that complicates family dynamics even further.
The film explores motherhood, identity and how perspectives change as roles reverse again.
Lohan is also set to star in and executive-produce the Hulu limited series “Count My Lies,” an adaptation of Sophie Stava’s novel that is currently in development and marks one of her first major television roles.
She will play Violet Lockhart alongside co-lead Shailene Woodley, who stars as Sloane Caraway, a compulsive liar whose small deceptions land her a job as a nanny for the seemingly perfect Lockhart family. Kit Harington has also joined the cast in a leading role.
As Sloane becomes increasingly entangled in Violet and her husband Jay’s world, hidden secrets begin to unravel, revealing dangerous truths beneath the family’s polished exterior. The series does not yet have an official release date.
