A Palestinian, a Juggler and an Oud

One of my favorite things about living in Paris is that you can make the city whatever you want it to be.

I’m not saying that Paris is like New York, where absolutely everything is available to you on a moment’s notice, from tech toys to exotic cuisine to illicit drugs to endangered species as pets. When we lived in New York, if we ran out of cat liter at 10 p.m., we simply called our pet supply shop around the corner and the owner would, within five minutes, send his delivery boy to our apartment with two boxes of that ultra-modern, odorless, crystalline cat liter stuff. New York is just like that when it comes to matters of lifestyle. If you want it, you can get it—in a New York minute.

Paris is like that when it comes to culture. There are genres of art and performance that I did not know existed until we moved here. Take, for example, juggling. In the U.S., juggling is something that perhaps the class clown does in his free time. A hobby. It’s goofy. It’s at worst a waste of time and at best a neat, interesting hobby. Here it can be a métier—a career, a profession.

And while tourists flock to venues such as the Moulin Rouge and Les Folies Bergères to see what they are told is French culture, I have learned that real French culture is much more interesting than touristy nude shows. If you’ve been to the summer arts festival in Avignon, you know what I’m talking about. If you’ve been to a neighborhood guignette, you’ve probably seen some pretty weird stuff. True French culture is a bit quirky, a bit different and often quite serious. Even their comedy is serious. The actors are well-trained and 100% devoted to their métier. And there are some métiers here that just don’t exist elsewhere. At a guinguette, I once saw a mime spend over 30 minutes conveying a deep-sea fishing outing to her audience. I loved it. She was wonderful. Her facial expressions spot on.

The Theatre d’Ivry Antoine Vitez, located in Ivry-sur-Seine near the Marie d’Ivry metro station, has an annual program that is full of such things—real French culture. The town of Ivry, one of the last of the “red ring” Communist towns on Paris’ fringes, is generously supportive of the arts. What goes on in the black box theatre is cutting edge and never dull.

For the next week at the Theatre d’Ivry is an absolutely mesmerizing two-man show called “Eko du Oud.”

It is a strange combination of men and their art. One man is a bit small and young with a downright gorgeous head of long, curly, black hair. He wears city black and his name is Adnan Joubran. He is Palestinian, born in Nazareth, and is a professional oud player. The oud is the Arab lute. His brother made his instrument for him and they have connected it to an amp for an even more unique sound.

The other man is tall and more muscular, middle-aged and completely bald. His name is Vincent Berhault. He also wears black, but it’s not so much city black as it is French cabaret black, with pinstriped pants and a black vest over a black t-shirt. He was born in Brittany and is very French. He is a professional juggler. He juggles. He dances. He is a gentleman juggler, meaning that he even juggles his hat. But he also juggles a crystal ball. He has toured with the Cirque Romanes Tzigane as a juggler. Perhaps you’ve seen him giving a similar performance at la Villette with a jazz musician.

These two men—the lute player and the ball juggler—come out on stage and never say a word, to either the audience or each other. They communicate through sly glances, facial expressions and movement. They improvise. No two shows are alike. Adnan sits stage right and plays his lute. His style is unique: it is almost like he’s playing a Spanish classical guitar with flamenco music flying from his fingers. He is obviously quite passionate about his music. For some performances, he feels compelled to sing beautiful Arabic lyrics.

While Adnan plays, Vincent dances and moves his body while he juggles. He is so comfortable with juggling that the balls move like an extension of his body. Both men carry out their art with apparent ease, self-assuredness and enjoyment. They add humor to the mix in a subtle way; you may find that you laugh out loud. Sometimes Vincent juggles even when there is no music and Adnan pretends not to approve of this. He will put the lute down in protest and shake his head at Vincent as if scolding a three-year-old. Sometimes Vincent pretends to get ahead of himself by trying to juggle five balls at once, only to back down, but continuing to nod to Adnan to keep playing while he musters up his courage.

The performance, lasting about an hour, is high-energy as Adnan plays his lute with deep passion and Vincent juggles the balls, his hat, bags and a crystal ball. The two highlights of the performance occur when the lights are turned down low and Vincent pulls out lighted balls for a mesmerizing light show and when Vincent juggles a crystal ball. So talented is he at juggling that he takes this fragile ball and flits it around his fingers and arms as gingerly as if it were a feather.

The performance is planned, with a touch of improvisation, and Adnan and Vincent are in almost perfect synch as Vincent interprets the Arabic music in his juggling with his movements.

Adnan is part of a group of three lute players known as the Joubran Trio. This group, of which Adnan is the youngest brother, has played at Carnegie Hall and plans to tour the U.S. and Canada next year. Their CDs are available for sale here.

You can see Adnan and Vincent this weekend at the Theatre d’Ivry at 6 p.m. on Saturday and at 11 a.m. and 4 p.m. on Sunday. Call 01 46 70 21 55 for a reservation or buy tickets online at fnac. All people, ages 4 to 104, are welcome. Children are definitely welcome to come to the show. To make a nice date out of your trek to Ivry, check out the nearby Etoile d’Agadir after the show for the best Moroccan cuisine Ivry has to offer.

And, as usual, if you'd like to see the duo online for a few minutes of a virtual performance, click on the photo below for a short video: