VI.BE

Mostafa Taleb was born in Lorestan (Iran), a mountainous land that also gave life to his instrument, the kamancheh.

He started to play this ancient Persian bowed string instrument at 14 years old, while studying acting, at the Azar Mehr Folklore Academy in Khorramabad. He then graduated both in architecture from the Mahallat University and in music from the Kamkarha Academy for Classical Persian Music in Tehran. He finally moved to Brussels in 2016.

Due to his talent and musical personality, he overcame the difficulties of exile and established a solid reputation as a Kamancheh player. Invited by viola da gamba legend Jordi Savall, he played numerous concerts across Europe with the ensemble Orpheus XXI. As part of the Cinemaximiliaan Silent Film music project "Egged on", Mostafa initiated several innovative musical bands around Persian classical music, such as the Persian ensemble Hamnava and Illumination. Thus, he launched an ongoing Orpheus XXI workshop in Brussels in collaboration with Muziekpublique.

In 2016, he composed and improvised for the string quintet "About that magic circle" and the soundtrack for the movie "Always there is no one" by Mansur Azizi. In 2018, he collaborated with Simon Ho (CH) on the composition of a soundtrack for a silent film at the Silent Film Festival in Gent (BE).

He joined the cast of Lisaboa Houbrechts' new play, "Bruegel", in 2019. With the harpsichordist and organist Jerome Bertier and the singers of the french choir Harmonia Sacra, he elaborated the unique musical soundtrack of this audacious play that has toured all across Western Europe since then.

After this collaboration around baroque music, Mostafa and Jerome Bertier created Argha/Nun, a sextet combining Western baroque music with Persian classical music. Bozar (Brussels) and the Goethe Institut in Tehran have supported them since 2021. In 2022, Mostafa recorded the album "Chapelle de Verre" with Ananta Roosens, an album with Orpheus XXI and Jordi Savall, and his own solo album, "Unity".