Camp Speicher

Camp Speicher Massacre

On June 12th, 2014, an estimated 1,566 unarmed Iraqi Air Force Cadets were killed by the Islamic State of Iraq

and the Levant (ISIL) at Camp Speicher in Tikrit. Shia and non-Muslim cadets were singled out from the Sunni

Cadets as some senior officers ordered the Cadets to leave wearing civilian cloths for a 15 day leave to visit their

families. The Cadets were kidnapped by gunpoint and taken on buses to the Al-Quisour Al-Re'asiya region. The

killing methods varied from shooting cadets one by one to shooting them while lying down to ensure death.

Camp Speicher is a single movement chamber work written for sextet (Clarinet, vn1,vn2, va, vc, and piano). The

work is intended as a healing message to relatives and family members of victims of atrocities throughout the

world. It incorporates both traditional and contemporary music practice as it weaves a tapestry of solemn

moments with sudden jagged entrances of various instruments which slowly evolve and search for a resolution

while eventually finding a place of hope and solace. The structure of this work is built on a number of middle

eastern elements such as the use of the Hijaz scale throughout and fragments of the traditional Iraqi folk song (Ah Ya Zain).