Reason for Prohibition: Women's Presence in Tehran Symphony Orchestra

The Tehran Symphony Orchestra, invited by officials to the closing ceremony of the World Clubs Wrestling Championships, was prevented from performing by unnamed authorities. The orchestra was set to perform the national anthem of Iran and several classical pieces. This was one of the performances intended to accompany the closing of the second edition of the World Clubs Wrestling Championships at the Azadi Sports Complex with a grand finale. However, it was stopped as part of a series of ongoing cancellations of music concerts ranging from pop and rock to this classical music event. This time, the reason was the presence of several female musicians. The Tehran Symphony Orchestra reopened last March after years of closure, with high hopes and under the direction of Ali Rahbari, an internationally recognized classical music figure. Rahbari had previously stated, "One of the beautiful days of my life was when I conducted the Berlin Philharmonic at the age of 30; I thought nothing could surpass that feeling. But here in Tehran, with the kids... 150 Iranians giving a concert... I never thought... it was completely new for me. We must take this somewhere. My contract is apparently for five years, but that doesn't mean anything. We must go up month by month to solve our problems as much as possible..." Someone who spoke so hopefully a few months ago now described the condition of excluding women from the performance as shameful and a great insult, and for this reason, he refused to perform without the women in his group and left the hall with all the orchestra members. It seems that pressures in Hassan Rouhani's government regarding music performance issues have intensified. Meanwhile, the Friday prayer leader of Mashhad has called the government's support for holding concerts, or what he calls "musician games," regrettable. Ali-Asghar Ramazani, a former official in the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance residing in London, states: "In my opinion, there are two reasons for this issue. The first reason is that the Ministry of Guidance has gradually retreated from all its powers in the music sector over the past two years, and instead of standing firm against the pressures it has faced, it has gradually relinquished its powers. To the extent that in an agreement made last year with the police, it even relinquished the right to issue permits and has completely abandoned the policy of insisting on artists' rights. The second reason is that the judiciary has shown increasing indifference to the permits from the Ministry of Guidance over the past two years and has increased its pressure on the Ministry, with prosecutors directly intervening in the music sector at the order of the head of the judiciary." It seems that based on an unwritten law, the scope of women's activities in music concerts in Iran is becoming narrower every day. In response to whether there is a law regarding this, Ramazani says: "Such a law, meaning the prohibition of female musicians, not only has not existed in the Ministry of Guidance but has never been present even in the rulings that were communicated to the Ministry of Guidance as religious rulings and opinions from Mr. Khamenei; this is a new invention that probably comes from the same authorities who, for example, prevented the Tehran Symphony Orchestra from performing, and it is still unclear who those authorities were. Both the Wrestling Federation and the Ministry of Guidance claim they had nothing to do with it, suggesting that such laws are enforced by those circles without any legal basis." Ali Rahbari, who seems to have not expected such treatment towards his concert group, says: "I have grown up in this country and know the red lines much better than others, and as long as I lead this orchestra, I will not allow such behaviors."