Tamar Festival 2021: Music lights the Dead Sea desert

• Published date: 24 September 2021
• Author: HADAS LABRISCH
• Publication title: Jerusalem Post, The: Web Edition Articles (Israel)

The Tamar Festival is a yearly Sukkot 4-day celebration of Israeli music, in shows backdropped against the breathtaking Masada. Shows are held every night and each early morning in a sunrise performance. After last year's festival fell was scheduled during what ended up being a COVID lockdown, the 2021 ensemble features over 25 artists in joint shows and guest acts.

As one of some 6,000 participants on the second night, I was ushered by dozens of staff and police to a parking site, stepped out into the sultry night, and was led up to the show on a shuttle. I was prepared for a traffic jam, but everything went smoothly; the event was impressively executed, with few lines and not-too-large crowds. Each visitor presented a Green Pass and the festival itself was spacious, with tables and sofas spread out several meters apart before the show. Most wore masks, at least until the songs began.

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The crowd was varied – teens in shorts and sandals and middle-aged couples in kippot and headdresses, seniors over 60, and families with toddlers, all with radiant faces at the prospect of a concert after a long cultural draught.

Some 2,000 seated and even more standing across a huge arena faced Hanan Ben Ari as he took to the stage. The atmosphere was electric – everywhere you looked, the audience was smiling and singing along with a freedom that was infectious.

"I didn't really believe this would happen. And even when the show was set, I didn't think anyone would come." Ben Ari said from the stage. "Some people say a performer is a sun, and the audience reflects his light like the moon. But under this full moon, you are the sun. And I promise we'll radiate your light a million times over."

The 33-year-old singer-songwriter has two successful albums under his belt. While many of his songs speak of God and religion, and one of his most well-known singles is a lament to the Gaza disengagement (Ima Im Haiti Yachol), his music is directed at everyone as he asks, "don't label me on Wikipedia" (Wikipedia). In a show over two hours long, Ben Ari was wild with energy, jumping across the stage and infusing each word with emotion.

For his song Cholem Kmo Yosef (Dream like Joseph), Ben Ari came into the crowd and perched atop a stand between the open ground and the bleachers, singing in the center of a thousands-strong circle chanting back his...