VIDEO: Musician Kayhan Kalhor Performs Music Inspired by the Cave Temples of Dunhuang

[Kamancheh music plays throughout]

Kayhan Kalhor: I think this room appealed to me more than the others in a way because of the relationship of the three worlds that is depicted here.

[Kamancheh music continues]

The underworld, the present, and the spiritual world, and then where we live and work on ourselves and bodies, our minds to elevate our spirituality to another world, to heaven. So these three levels was really interesting because to make you think that this kind of idea, this thought, this relationship between all these different levels of being, being thought of even in ancient times.

And in a way, this is very important to my culture, the same kind of ideology in different religions that happened there, in Persia as well—Zoroastrianism, after that Islam. And then the same kind of vision, basically, that we believe in all these three worlds, but meanwhile, we’re living only in one, and try to make a better one for the future with what we do in this world, and how we live and how we try to make ourselves a better person, so we elevate ourselves in the future world.

[Kamancheh music plays till the end]