H.E. Huda Ibrahim Alkhamis. Madrid, June 2019. Photo: Kirill Bashkirov

I need to be honest with you and I must admit that I hadn’t heard of you before your visit to Madrid. And the few things I know about you now it is because I read it on the Internet. You were born in Beirut…

My mother is Syrian. I was brought up in Lebanon until the beginning of the civil war and then we left. My father is Saudi Arabian. Of course, I come from the UAE. So, my origin is Saudi.

Since you always say you want to use music as a dialogue, I’d like to have a true dialogue now with you even if it means I have to ask some tricky questions.

Please, do.

Your work with the foundation has to do with music culture. What’s your perspective when you look, for instance, at Lebanon, a country at war. Isn’t that a conflict for you, I mean, to speak about music and culture while people are dying?

Not at all. I’ll tell you. Of course, I left Lebanon long ago when I was a child… War and peace, peace and war, they’ll always be there. In every country, in every place, in different ways we had the cold war and so on. But I feel our role, we as individuals, we have a choice. What do we support? Do we support peace? Do we support a conversation? Do we support to find ways for understanding? To find ways to counter the decisions of war? I wish from my heart that, at a very high level, war will be abolished. Slavery abolished! War abolished! It’s not a choice. [Huda takes a deep breath and there is a little silence; then she smiles and continues] Until this happens, me and you, we make the choice that the way to counter that is finding ways of understanding culture. Culture is the arts, it’s the music, it’s the story of humanity, it’s what you are doing through your writing, documenting our story, through what I’m trying to do: to invest in the youth, invest in every individual. I believe in the message that we can build something together, benefit the humanity. That’s culture. And that’s when music comes in. And that’s why I’m here. Many people do not know what it stands for. And now today we met. So, there’s a curiosity. And from this curiosity we open doors. Where will they take us? I don’t know. But I know one thing: if there is a will, a true will, a true will to build up on civilizations, to build up on the future, to converse and to work together for the embetterment of the humanity using the arts, the music as our tools to bring up a society of happy youth. Let them decide, let them take us. This is what I stand for.

Maestro Péter Eötvös, Paloma O'Shea & Huda I. Alkhamis at Escuela Superior de Música Reina Sofía. Photo by Kirill Bashkirov

In your speech at the Escuela Superior de Música Reina Sofía for the final concert of the academic year with the Freixenet Orchestra conducted by Péter Eötvös, you said your presence in Madrid was due to two women you admire: Queen Sofia and Paloma O’Shea. From Mrs O’Shea you said you had learnt that in order to become a leader, you have to have a vision, a dream and the will. To me it’s quite clear you have willpower, I can tell, but what’s your vision? What’s your dream? Precisely, now.

[There is a little silence again. Huda closes her eyes and lets her inner voice speak]
My dream is to give the youth the future, the chance for a better life in every single aspect, the chance to be happy through creative thinking, free creative thinking, open the doors for them. Let them feel that they can dream themselves, that they can move forward themselves, that they can get every strength they have, they can find every strength they have and be free, be free! When we have no fear, we are free. My dream is to have a youth with no fear and free in their minds, in their spirits to think and to move forward in every aspect. My currency, my tool is the arts. Music is at the heart. And why music? Because music opens the hearts, it opens the minds, opens the souls and has no boundaries. Get them these tools and let them discover. So, my dream is to have the youth with no fear and with freedom. Freedom of spirit and freedom of the mind.

What would you say, for instance, to young people who feel disappointed? How can they overcome that disappointment with life?

I would tell them one thing: you will need to be disappointed to be appointed in the future! Learn from it, learn from your failure and take it as an advantage and not as a disadvantage.

So what did you learn from your failures?

Perseverance. My failures drove me to the right path. If I fail at something, I know it was not the right way for many reasons. Where are the reasons? 1, 2 3… So, Huda, the right way is to avoid these 1, 2, 3 and go to 4 and 5. But never give up! Never! You know, I celebrate my failure.

Being a woman has it been an advantage or a disadvantage for you in the path towards achieving your dream?

It’s like a diamond with different facets for this question. As a woman, being from the United Arab Emirates, I was lucky. Why? Because the leadership in my country gives equal opportunities for women and men. Prove yourself and we will support you! Talk to us, convince us and we will support you! So, here I am almost 25 years ago going to the leadership and to my supporter —one of my major sponsors was here today, who came specially from Abu Dhabi to Madrid for the press conference and the concert—. Going to them and tell them “I would like to invest in the youth and everything we were talking about just one minute ago, my currency will be the performing arts at the heart of ii is music, and I’m saying classical music, opera, and I need your money to do that”. At that time there was no music conservatoire, the facilities we have today, we played under the stars. But they understood me. Do you know why they understood me? Because this was their vision. They wanted a better future, they wanted to invest in the youth, they wanted a youth with an open mind… But how do we do it? It’s the individual. It’s for us to move and to help the leadership to move forward. I come from a very young country… So, they saw that and they supported me. And I was lucky in here. I had many obstacles, of course, difficulties? Of course. Challenges? Loads until today. But I took it. So, as a woman I was lucky, because I am from the United Arab Emirates. As a woman with children and husband and babies —my husband comes from a pioneering business family; we have the house open and receive their guests—, I love to be with my children… Family for me is the essence of my life. They are very important. So, to balance that was not easy. But, again, I was privileged to come from a family that we support each other. So, I have my mother, I have the neighbors coming there. So, I took advantage of all that and they help! And we need to help each other. And I am grateful! But a woman today can do everything once she decides and I think in every business, I believe that. It’s only for her to decide and to manage. I think it is so simple.

You have been talking about youth, what would you say to a Western woman who is in her twenties and who is feeling in her own flesh the lack of employment and opportunities?

The first thing I’d say is “Don’t lose hope”. As you said, lack of opportunities and unemployment is very high. I agree with you. But I say: don’t lose hope. Always find a way! Keep your determination. Think of what you want to do and if you have the conviction, then you will do it. Keep your focus. And what I see for the young ladies today… You know, we live in the age of technology, but don’t forget the values. Believe in yourself and keep at it. Never compromise! If you do your job, do it well, from your heart and don’t just do it halfway. Do it perfect!

And why did you decide to go for music and not painting or writing or any other kind of arts?

I really don’t know. They asked me this question many times. Music is so powerful! Music is the ultimate power of the art forms. It’s so abstract yet it so powerful! It’s so reachable! I just love it. I don’t know, I’ve been born this way. My path was followed with music. You know, we are surrounded by magnetic fields, we are surrounded by sounds, we are surrounded by vibes… From the beginning, I must have had these vibes of music that elevate the soul and elevate the person.

You’ve travelled the world, you’ve met lots of people and had lots of interviews, I guess, so what’s the question you’ve never been asked?

There will always be a question that has not been asked, but I don’t know. When it comes, I will answer.

That’s a good answer. Maybe this one is that question. What will happen with all your projects, with your vision, when Huda is no longer there, when you die?

[Huda closes her eyes, gently smiles and starts speaking]
I believe that this vision of conversation, of understanding, of culture, of tolerance, of music from the heart will survive Huda for ever long. It will have to survive. This is what I feel.

What are your musical projects for this year and for the future?

We’ll continue to invest in the youth and the educational programs. These projects of creating new opportunities not only take efforts but continuous funding, continuous work with the students and they come from everywhere in the world. The Abu Dhabi Festival will continue to flourish in the classical music, in the performing arts, in the jazz.

When you look back in life and see the twenty year old Huda, what would you tell her?

Huda, when she was twenty, was studying Arts History in Paris and part of her studies was history of classical music. I went to my dean and I told him “I’m gonna drop this course, I can’t take it, I don’t understand music, I don’t feel music, you’re taking me to the opera Garnier and I’m the only Arab in the class, I feel like a stranger.” And he said: “Huda you don’t drop; please, just be patient. If anyone else told me, I’d say, ok, do so, but you are very sensitive for the music, so please don’t drop.” So I did not. And I say to Huda of the age of twenty: “Thank you Huda for not dropping the history of music! Thank you for working hard, because, Huda, look what you are doing today!”

And what would the twenty year old Huda say to you now?

Oh my god, Huda, Bravo! You made it!

We have been speaking about the youth but what would you tell those people we call elderly, who have a life and think there is nothing left to do?

Talk to me, please. Tell me your story. Tell me how I can keep on. Help me! I need you!

Michael Thallium

Global & Greatness Coach
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I think I should first explain how I came across George Santayana —quite a chance encounter by the way—, whom I had never heard of in my life. Of course, since he died in 1952, I do not mean I met him personally unless I were dead —knock on wood!— and had that strange power of coming back to life from the afterworld. No, my encounter with him was a bit more intelectual than physical. It was reading Invitation to Philosophizing Following The Spirit and Writings of Antonio Machado (“Invitación a filosofar según espíritu y letra de Antonio Machado”) by Juan David García Bacca —another Spanish philosopher— that I read the name “Jorge Santayana”. It caught my attention, because I had never heard of him before, and my attention turned into curiosity when I found out about him and got to know that Santayana had written all of his books in English. Actually, he changed the Spanish name “Jorge” —roughly pronounced ‘Horhey’— by “George” and he is considered one of the greatest American writers of the 20th century. However, he always remained Spanish. That was striking to me! Was it possible that a Spanish born in 1863 would turn into an American man of letters? After a little research I did, I manage to buy one of his books, Persons and Places, at Menosdiez, a little second-hand bookshop in Madrid downtown. I wanted to try and see whether he really was such a great writer as they said. Santayana had been a nominee to the Pulitzer Prize for his novel The Last Puritan (1936), but he was never awarded with the prize, apparently because he was not an American citizen and had always kept his Spanish passport.

And what a great writer he is indeed! I loved Persons and Places, an autobiography written at his late 70s where he beautifully describes an amazing life of academical achievements, travelling and philosophy. The book is divided up into sixteen chapters where he speaks about his origins in Spain, his teenage years in Boston, his achievements at Harvard University as an adult and his later return to Europe when he quit Harvard at age 48.

George Santayana may be the writer —not only prose but poetry as well, see A poet’s testament and O World— who best wrote about Spain in English. And for sure reading Persons and Places is a great exercise for those of us who want to master the English language and the knowledge about life in the late 19th and early 20th centuries in the United States, Spain and Europe. In all that regards himself, his thoughts, or his happiness, Santayana crossed a desert more than once in his life; so that when he looks back over those years, he sees objects, he sees public events, he sees persons and places, but he doesn’t see himself. His inner life, as he recalls it, seems to be concentrated in a few oases, in a few halting places, Green Inns, or Sanctuaries, where the busy traveller stopped to rest, to think, and to be himself. Now you may understand the practical reasons why I chose the music of Victoria while I was writing these lines. If you don’t, don’t worry, maybe someday you too will connect the dots.

Michael Thallium

Global & Greatness Coach
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Now, some years later, and assuming the hypothesis that there is such a thing as human greatness, I’ll dedicate the next three months to capture that greatness and, in due course, I’ll share it on this website. In order to do that, I’ll use my camera and pen. Anyone who would like to contribute with ideas or images representing the greatness of human being, please do so by leaving a comment on this blog or getting in touch with me by email, Skype, Facebook or Twitter.

Let’s get down to work!

Michael Thallium

Global & Greatness Coach
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You can also find me and connect with me on:

Facebook Michael Thallium and Twitter Michael Thallium