Billy Kelly's expanded and increasingly impressive Big Big World Festival now stands out as an essential event in Glasgow. So far, the biggest and happiest surprise has been Trio Adel Salameh, a band composed of Palestinian oud (Arab lute) virtuoso Adel Salameh, Israeli bendir (frame-drum) player Asas Sinkis and Algerian vocalist Naziha Azzouzi. They are crossing barriers in every sense and the small c.c.a. venue on Sauchiehall Street only added to the intimacy and intensity.

This line-up was specially put together for this, their first live performance, by Salameh, in defiance of all cultural barriers. You could praise the trio just for existing but the sound itself is a swooning confluence of ancient and modern Middle Eastern and North African music which streams seamlessly through a stark framework of oud and pattering drums, with Azzouzi's vocals floating with a melancholic edge, like a sad curl of memory.

Ancient Arabic songs are followed by traditional Jewish wedding dances. Salameh's fast note-bending and lightning-strike rhythms make him the Paco Pena of the oud but it was Sinkis's percussive scrapings and nudges that lent speed and humour to a sometimes austere sound.

As a Jewish-Arab-Algerian trio - who never once state the obvious - they are an enormous cultural breakthrough. As an artistic unit they do something vital; as an event, call it a small miracle on Sauchiehall Street.