West–Eastern Divan Orchestra

The West–Eastern Divan Orchestra is a youth orchestra based in Seville, Spain, consisting of musicians from countries in the Middle East, of Egyptian, Iranian, Israeli, Jordanian, Lebanese, Palestinian, Syrian and Spanish background.

It was founded in 1999 by the conductor Daniel Barenboim and academic Edward Said, and named after an anthology of poems by Goethe.

The Argentine-Israeli conductor Daniel Barenboim and the late Palestinian-American academic Edward Said founded the orchestra in 1999, and named the ensemble after an anthology of poems by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. The first orchestra workshop was in Weimar, Germany, in 1999, after the organisation had received over 200 applications from Arab music students. Barenboim has also expressed interest in musicians from Iran (a non-Arab country but in conflict with Israel) and allocating three chairs for Iranian musicians to play in the orchestra each year.

The orchestra under Barenboim, in the presence of Italian President and Mrs. Giorgio Napolitano, performed for Pope Benedict XVI at the courtyard of the Apostolic Palace of Castel Gandolfo 11 July 2012, the abbot Saint Benedict of Nursia's (the founder of the Benedictines) feast day, and thus the name day of the Pope.

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