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Lebanon's Baalbeck Festival moves world audience with dramatic online performance

Lebanon's beloved Baalbeck Festival has survived various challenging times, and this year was no exception.
Maestro Harout Fazlian conducts rehearsals ahead of the Sound of Resilience concert inside the Temple of Bacchus at the historic site of Baalbek in Lebanon's eastern Bekaa Valley, on July 4, 2020. - The Lebanese philharmonic orchestra performed to spectator-free Roman ruins in east Lebanon, after a top summer festival downsized to a single concert in a year of economic meltdown and COVID-19 pandemic. The Baalbek International Festival was instead beamed live on television and social media, in what its direc

The Baalbeck Festival has long celebrated Lebanon’s remarkable cultural depth and diversity as well as the country’s resilience.

Founded in 1956, the festival has gathered Lebanese and international audiences alike to see classical and innovative artists from Lebanon and worldwide. The festival suspended its activities from 1975 to 1996 due to the civil war, and again during the Israeli war on Lebanon in 2006. Each time, the festival has come back stronger than ever. 

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