| Iraqi-born Kazem Al-Saher has established himself as the
biggest singer in the Middle East, having sold more than 30 million
albums since the start of his career. Ranging from big romantic
ballads to more political work, from pop to Arab classical, he's
covered the spectrum of music with the kind of success not seen
since the heyday of Umm Kalthum. Al-Saher was born in 1961 in
Nainawa, Northern Iraq, one of ten children of a palace worker. His
interest in music came not from lessons, but the radio, where he
learned the works of composers like Mohamed Abdel Wahab by hearing
them. When he was ten, he sold his bicycle to buy a guitar and two
years later, began writing songs. He switched to oud, a much more
common instrument, and was accepted into the Baghdad Music Academy
at the age of 21. Keen to break through in the music business with
his songs and voice, he found himself rebuffed by all the producers
he approached, who'd only let him sing their material. Instead, he
used the back door to gain entry to the industry. With a television
director friend, he made a video of one of his songs, Ladghat El
Hayya (The Snake Bite), which was slipped into a broadcast on Iraqi
television in 1987, just after the Iran-Iraq war. An allegory to his
situation, it caused a major controversy and the powers that ran
television offered him a choice -- change the lyrics or have it
banned. He refused to change anything, but the banning only made it
more popular. He began giving concerts all over the Gulf and
recording for labels in Kuwait. A year later, he had a hit with
Obart Al Shat (I Crossed the Ocean). Some of his professors at the
Academy denounced it as sha'bi (pop) music, anathema to those
who taught classical music. But protesting was pointless. Al-Saher
had managed to circumvent the system and had become a star on his
own terms -- he even undertook his first U.S. tour in 1989. Having
conquered pop, Al-Saher turned around and established himself in the
Arabic classical world with La Ya Sadiki (No, My Friend), a magnum
opus that lasted almost an hour and found him using maqams (scales)
that hadn't been used in Iraqi music in several decades,
revitalizing a tradition. The Gulf War and its immediate aftermath
kept him pinned in Iraq, but in 1993 he transferred his base of
operations to Lebanon, working with the poet Nizar Qabbani, who
wrote lyrics to his music, before settling permanently in Cairo.
Al-Saher continued to release albums and tour, having become the
biggest name in Middle Eastern music, one whose ballads grew bigger
and more romantic, but who would also write classically influenced
works, even when they might hurt his popularity.
By 1998 he was lauded as an artist, not just a pop star. That
prestige brought him wider fame and a growing international
reputation that won him a UNICEF award for his song "Tathakkar,"
which he performed in the U.S. for Congress and the United Nations
-- one of the first real post-Gulf War cultural exchanges. The
following year, he recorded a tribute to the Pope with the Italian
Symphony Orchestra. While still a fan of large orchestras, whose
sweep helps define his music, he's remained open to technological
innovation, even going so far as to allow a remix (by fusionists
Transglobal Underground) of his song La Titnahad, taken from his
2000 release El Hob El Moustahil (The Impossible Love), the first of
his albums to be given an official American release. To coincide
with it, he performed on the Mondo Melodia tour, which crossed the
U.S.
Chris Nickson |
