Zied ZOUARI

Born an raised into a family of musicians, Zied Zouari started to play the violin at the age of seven. He won the first prize for children-performers in Tunis in 1996, and the gold medal at the Festival of Young Creative Artists in Kram, Tunisia in 1997.
In 1998, he represented Tunisia at the first Encounter of Young Arab Musicians in Dubai where he was awarded the gold medal. His professional career began with the great Lebanese singer Wadi Safî in 1999.
Armed with a solid music schooling, Zied arrived in Paris in 2006, where he rubbed shoulders with artists from different musical backgrounds and performed with well known names such Sylvain Luc, Daniel Mille, Bojan Z, Manu Théron (Cantates des Rives), Thione Seck, Mathias Duplessy (Duplessy & the violins of the world), Dorsaf Hamdani (Barbara Fairouz), Emel Mathlouthi where he met Imed Alibi. With him Zied coproduced, composed and arranged the Safar album, in collaboration with Justin Adams. As a solo violinist, Zied has performed in Carthage Festival, but also in a number of prestigious halls in Paris: Institute of the Arab World, the Zénith, Théâtre des Champs Elysées, Théâtre de la Ville and La Cigale.
Zied Zouari obtained a PhD in music and musicology from the Sorbonne (2014), a DEM in Jazz from Paris CNR (2012), and has been the musical director of Kalila Wa Dimna, an original opera production created for the Aix en Provence Festival in 2016 and the soloist of Goran Bregovic new project Three Letters from Sarajevo in 2017.
In 2015 he was awarded the best performer prize at Festival des Journées Musicales in Carthage (JMC) for his solo concert. Although Arab-Oriental music is his chosen field, Zied is very much inspired by Jazz, electro, and rock music. Because of his fusion approach, influenced by a variety of styles ranging from Afro-Arab and Indo-Turkish traditions to classical music, Jazz and World music, he is on the point of becoming a reference in contemporary violin repertoire in Arab music. His stage experience and his double culture make Zied Zouari a specialist in music cross-over. His solo concert that toured all over Europe in 2014 is an invitation to a journey towards an atypical artistic universe of an exceptional violinist.
Zied has recently worked on his new album entitled Maqâm Roads, released in November 2017.

Photo credit: Philippe Poulinas