In the artist's words:

Ali Ungan was born in Adana, Turkey, in 1967. After graduating in chemistry, he came to Germany in 1992. He completed a qualification seminar at the Goethe Institute and taught German as a foreign language and music at the Mannheim Institute for Integration and the German-Turkish Cultural Center in Mannheim. Ali Ungan is an active musician and co-founder of the Oriental Music Academy Mannheim. From 2003 to 2010, he taught the compulsory subject "Music and Movement" at the Free Intercultural Waldorf School in Mannheim and led several school projects. He taught Alevi religion at the Astrid Lindgren School in Mannheim and regularly took part in the "Islamic Religious Education" training series organized by the Baden-Württemberg Ministry of Youth, Culture and Sport.

In collaboration with the OMM, Ali Ungan has led several cooperation projects since 2008, which are based on his concept of "Intercultural learning through music and movement", including at the Jungbuschschule elementary school and the Johannes-Kepler-Werkrealschule in Mannheim. Since July 2011, he has been teaching music and intercultural communication as part of a teaching assignment at the SRH Fachschule für Soziales in Heidelberg. At the OMM he teaches saz, tanbur and rebab.