For the Thursday-through-Sunday stretch of 22–25 October, one compact route begins in Brussels and closes in Antwerp: three concerts where inherited musical languages meet present-tense performance. Friday’s programme at Art Base foregrounds Greek traditional song. Saturday at deSingel places two Egyptian-rooted projects back to back, moving from the circular, rhythm-led sound of The Handover to Abdullah Miniawy’s voice-and-trombone trio. The sequence is useful for listeners drawn to texture and vocal presence, with each stop offering a different relationship between repertoire, repetition and improvisation.[1][2][3][4]

Friday, 23 October: Aegean songs at Art Base

Kaiti Koullia brings Songs from the Aegean Sea to Art Base at 20:00 on Friday, 23 October, joined by Nikos Tsouvalas on lyre and Nikos Venetakis on lute. Art Base lists the evening under Greek traditional music, and its small central-Brussels room gives this three-person configuration a clear, close-range premise: voice at the centre, with the lyre and lute shaping the melodic and rhythmic frame around it. For a guide built around living traditional materials, this is the patient opening chapter—an evening directed toward tone, ornament and the grain of acoustic instruments. Art Base’s own calendar places this date inside a concentrated four-day sequence of Greek and eastern Mediterranean programming: a Gipsy Night precedes it on Thursday, a workshop with Koullia and Hristiana Katsarou is scheduled Saturday afternoon, and the Aegean concert returns that evening. That context makes Friday a discrete concert but also the opening night of a short residency-scale presence.[1]

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Saturday, 24 October: The Handover’s ritual pulse at deSingel

At 20:00 on Saturday, 24 October, deSingel presents The Handover in the Theaterstudio. The venue describes the Egypt-, Norway- and Belgium-based trio as drawing from rhythmic rituals of rural Egypt while folding in psychedelic improvisation, krautrock riffs and experimental sound. Its presentation is built as a long-form arc, beginning in drones and gathering toward pulsing dance rhythms; that makes this an immersive first half for anyone who hears repetition as a source of movement. deSingel has programmed the concert within Shifting Sounds and pairs it directly with Miniawy later that evening, turning a single booking into a considered two-part listening session.[2][4]

Saturday, 24 October: Abdullah Miniawy after the drums

Abdullah Miniawy Trio follows at deSingel at 21:30. Miniawy, an Egyptian composer, writer and singer, appears with French trombonists Robinson Khoury and Jules Boittin. deSingel frames the trio around Egyptian vocals, jazz and poetry, with Sufi influence alongside baroque, operatic, Coptic and contemporary elements. That instrumentation gives the late set a different pressure from The Handover: a human voice negotiating with two brass instruments, and poetry carried through an improvised-jazz setting. The venue offers the two concerts as a double bill, so the Saturday route has a built-in logic: rhythmic collective force first, then a tighter, text-led encounter.[3][4]

Plan the route

Choose Art Base on Friday, 23 October at 20:00 for Kaiti Koullia’s Aegean programme, then make Saturday in Antwerp a two-show evening at deSingel: The Handover at 20:00 and Abdullah Miniawy Trio at 21:30. Art Base’s official calendar and deSingel’s event pages carry the current programme information, while deSingel also flags limited availability for its Saturday performances. Recheck the official pages before travelling for ticket availability, access details and any last-minute schedule changes.[1][2][3]

Sources

  1. Art Base agenda — Art Base
  2. The Handover — Senses Of Egypt’s Ritual Music — DE SINGEL
  3. Abdullah Miniawy Trio — Poetic Jazz Transcendence — DE SINGEL
  4. 4x Egypt in the music programme — DE SINGEL