Through the lives of some of the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra musicians, Elena Cheah reconstructs the journey and significance of one of the most powerful social/cultural projects to have taken place between the end of the last century and the new millennium. The West-Eastern Divan Orchestra was founded in 1988 by Daniel Barenboim and Edward Said bringing together both Arab and Israeli professional musicians. The testimonies that have been put together in this book highlight the vitality, the problems and the enthusiasm that surround the very specific type of harmony relating to an orchestra as a whole. Conceived as a workshop for peace, the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra, in these pages, is seen from many different angles, occasionally touching on existential issues, political ones and the desire to create a musical professionalism away from the implications and hardships of a world full of division and conflict.