In 2022, we are commemorating one thousand years of existence of the most beautiful treatise on love ever written on our peninsula, “The Ring of the Dove and the Shadow of a Cloud,” authored by one of our most brilliant and unknown Cordovan intellectuals, Ibn Hazm.

To celebrate this anniversary, we will listen to the words of Antonio Manuel (author of the historical novel “The Light We Were,” whose main character is Ibn Hazm) and the music by La banda morisca, to journey through the Cordoba that was once the capital of the world, at the time when “The Ring of the Dove” was written.

We will be talking about the popular revolution which broke out in 1009, perhaps the first revolution in the West, the destruction of the palaces of Medina Alzahira and Medina Azahara, and the end of Cordoba’s Umayyad caliphate. We will be doing this through the eyes of the women of Al-Andalus (including free women and slaves, of many races, statuses and religions, both poor and rich), many of whom taught music, played musical instruments, acted as court scribes, recited poetry, and more...

Antonio Manuel’s words will merge with the music of La banda morisca, melding Moorish and Berber melodies with flamenco. Cordoba deserves to be aware of its past and to celebrate this momentous event in our history: the millennium of The Ring of the Dove.

This group is made up of musicians of different origins who share in common the music of their roots and tradition, with a concern for experimenting and evoking the cultural heritage of age-old Al-Andalus and its reflection in the sounds of today’s Andalusia, Maghreb and Middle East. Inspired by this Moorish heritage and by the traditional “romancero,” the group offers a creative, original outlook through a playlist mixing Eastern and Western influences, from the Mediterranean (Moorish “moaxajas,” Chaabi, Dahmane el Harachi, Nass el Ghiwane...) with the spirit of traditional flamenco and Andalusian rock (El Chozas, Lole y Manuel, Triana...).

An Andalusian intellectual and committed teacher, while still quite young his first novel, “Nenia,” won the National “Amador de los Ríos” Award, and shortly thereafter he was given the Scholarship of Literary Creation of the Provincial Government of Cordoba, with “El desmayado vuelo de las cigüeñas” (“The Fainted Flight of the Storks”). After publishing several poetry books, he turned to music and became a founding member and composer of the group Deneuve. A contributor to various media, with the script of “El Velo” (“The Veil”), he earned the International Prize of Casablanca and the Social Denunciation Award of Salobreña. He has always combined his creative work with teaching and social, cultural and political activism. With a PhD in Law, he is a professor of Civil Law, has authored several legal essays and coordinates the well-known “Legal Laboratory on Evictions.” He was one of the founders and president of the “Ateneos de Andalucía” Federation. A staunch defender of Al-Andalus’ legacy in our heritage and history, he helped promote the candidacy of the Andalusian Moors’ descendants for the Prince of Asturias Concord Award. A trustee of the Blas Infante Foundation, he joined forces with Manuel Pimentel to edit “Andalucía. Teoría y Fundamento Político” (Andalusia: Theory and Political Foundation”) by Blas Infante (Almuzara, 2009), and rescued from oblivion the popular play “Entre dos fuegos” by Manuel Alba (Berenice, 2007). After publishing “La Huella Morisca” (Almuzara, 2010), which was highly acclaimed by critics and readers and is now a well-known work of reference, he went back to writing novels with “El soldado asimétrico” and, more recently, with “La Luz que fuimos: Rebelión en Córdoba” (Almuzara, 2022).