Three pianists bringing healing through their music

Chopin: I Am Not Afraid Of Darkness explores the idea of music being an antidote to violence and suffering. Here the three protagonists talk about playing Chopin in some of the world’s darkest places.

Chopin: I Am Not Afraid Of Darkness is a documentary that tries to answer a simple question: can music heal emotional wounds? The film follows three pianists as they prepare to perform Chopin’s music in three different places which have witnessed violence and destruction and, in doing so, it uncovers traumas that the pianists themselves live with.

Fares Marek Basmadji, a Syrian pianist living in London, emigrated from his native country as a young teenager. In the film, he visits a Syrian refugee camp in Lebanon, and later performs his concert in Beirut, just one month after it was devastated by an explosion in 2020.

“Chopin’s music struck a chord during his lifetime, and it brought his native Poland’s political struggles to the world’s attention,” explains Basmadji.  “But this was only possible because he was an exile himself and someone that 19th-century elite society cared for – and he used that platform to take his message to the whole world. His legacy remains strong, and I...