Quartet for Garlic, Cello, Mouth & Telephone: A Symphony of Love, Trauma & Lots of Garlic

After a resounding response on its opening night, Quartet for Garlic, Cello, Mouth & Telephone returned to the Studio Theatre, Centre in the Square. Created and performed by Ben Gorodetsky and Miriam Stewart-Kroeker, the performance concluded this Wednesday.

Looking back at the performance, the audience, including myself, were engrossed in a symphony of love, trauma and, of course, lots of garlic. The air was filled with the garlic’s pungency carried by the melodies from the cello baring the weight of Raiya’s story.

The performance left a lasting impact, more questions than answers ranging from thinking about which one of Raiya’s recipes to try to the history and politics behind her hunger and need to feed people.

Towards the end of the performance, the audience received some garlic to cook and share just like Raiya did. My biggest takeaway was my garlic, with a shoot coming out of it. It was ready to give everything it had, just to be grown and fed to everybody, like Raiya would have wanted.