Al-Kamandjati Institution

The manufacture of musical instruments at the Al-Kamandjati Association is a unique success story, as it sought to preserve heritage through establishing a specialized workshop for manufacturing and restoring musical instruments, located within the association's buildings, where visitors can sometimes watch the artisans during their precise manual work amid the smell of wood and strings. Al-Kamandjati is considered a reference not only in teaching playing, but also in "sound engineering" through this craft that combines art and precise carpentry, as the association played an essential role in filling the shortage of high-quality musical instruments in Palestine and providing maintenance services for students and musicians. Its workshop focuses mainly on manufacturing stringed instruments, whether Eastern or Western, such as the oud and qanun, where luxurious types of wood are chosen to ensure sound quality. It also restores and maintains violins, cellos, and double basses. Al-Kamandjati enlisted international instrument experts and makers from France and Italy to train Palestinian technicians in the principles of this precise profession, so that it now has a local staff capable of manufacturing an instrument from scratch, making it one of the few places in the region that offers this level of professionalism.