This is a podcast from the archives of the BBC Ruth Lectures. This lecture in the series

In the beginning was sound, given by Daniel Barrenboim, was originally broadcast in 2006.

Hello and welcome. For the last two in this series of wreath lectures, we've come to the Middle East.

Daniel Baramboym had intended to deliver this, the fourth lecture,

in the Palestinian city of Ramallah.

But because of the growing tensions in the West Bank,

we've been advised not to go there.

So both lectures will be delivered here in Jerusalem,

but in different parts of the city.

Today, we're just outside the walls of the old city,

in an area mainly inhabited by Palestinians

who make up the bulk of our audience.

Baramboym is a controversial figure in this part of the world.

A Jew whose family made their home in Israel when he was 10 years old, he believes that

the destinies of Israelis and Palestinians are, as he puts it,

inextricably linked. And he's tried to exemplify this through that which he knows best, music.

In 1999, he joined with the late Palestinian intellectual Edward Saeed to create an orchestra

made up of young Israeli and Arab musicians,

called the West Eastern Divan Orchestra,

it's the living representation of its founder's central belief

that music has the power to bring people together.

To explain why and how, please would you welcome the Reith Lecturer 2006, Daniel Barrenboyne.

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