T2
June 07, 2004
Baghdad calling
By Michael Binyon
This critic hails Kazem Al-Sahir, the Iraqi-born superstar of Arab
music
SHYLY, awkwardly, the two boys made their way on stage, their
artificial arms hanging stiffly by their sides. Their idol bent down
to embrace them. The audience roared its applause. All three, native
sons of Iraq, turned in pride to the cameras. The two youngest, Ali
and Ahmed, were the victims of allied bombing, the faces of suffering
known across the world. Their hero, Kazem al-Sahir, is a man whose
voice echoes daily from millions of screens and radios across the
Middle East, the most charismatic Arab singer of his generation.
Filling the Albert Hall to raise money for children in the Middle
East takes a lot of pulling power. At a top price of �175 a seat,
tickets were expensive. But al-Sahir, a slim, handsome man with close-
cropped hair, chiseled jaw and a voice unmatched for a generation, is
a big enough name to attract Arabs from all parts of the country.
Though largely unknown in the West, he is a superstar from Morocco to
Kuwait and beyond. And his one-night concert confirmed two things:
that the rhythms and harmonies of Arabic music are increasingly
influencing Western pop, and that al-Sahir, single-handedly, has done
more than any Iraqi to restore the name of his suffering native land.
With 30 million record sales underpinning his reputation, al-Sahir
already has a repertoire that most Arabs know by heart. It is
remarkably eclectic. He trained at Baghdad Musical Academy, mastering
the oud, the traditional lute, and immersing himself in the haunting
Gulf melodies of the past. Many come through in his singing, with its
vibrato dwelling on a single note and austere rhythms.
But his range is huge � music from the Maghreb, Egypt and the Levant
as well as the more modern Arabic pop that has the beat and culture
of Western rock. He refuses to use synthesizers. But despite his
attempts to revive the old Iraqi maqam music system and classical
harmonies, he admits that Arab music is being changed by Western
influence.
Now 46, he began writing songs at 12. Some have been trademarks for
years, and he sings them on demand. "Zidini, zidini," the audience
shouts, calling for his famous setting of a traditional poem � "Give
me more of your passion" � that he wrote when he was 21. He turns
back to his orchestra, the 22-strong group that has been with him
from the start, as if to consult. They knew they would play it
anyway, but the apparent spontaneity brings roars of excitement.
More than in Western music, the words matter. Metaphor, allusion and
resonance are intrinsic to Arab music. Al-Sahir is a romantic of the
desert, the past and the fleeting, intangible nostalgia of a woman's
beauty. His songs are about love, loss, pain and longing.
His most famous are based on the poetry of Nizar Qabbani, the
celebrated late Syrian poet whose mastery of Arabic's old and rich
vocabulary stirs profound emotion. Such lines as "My love dances
barefoot at the entrance to my veins" and "Tell me you love me, so
that my fingers will become as gold" may sound trite in translation;
in the original they are magical.
Politics inevitably intrudes. Any concert by an Iraqi in London is
bound to provoke the anger and nationalism swirling in almost every
Arab, supporters and � overwhelmingly � opponents of the Iraq war
alike. The Albert Hall audience was full of men waving defiant Iraqi
flags. When the children were brought on stage, the chilling Saddam-
era chant rang out: "With our souls, with our blood, we will protect
you, Iraq!"
Al-Sahir himself suffered under Saddam, was conscripted into the army
at the age of 21 and saw one of his early songs, Snake Bite, banned
for its description of Baghdad's climate of fear and restriction at
the end of the Iran-Iraq war. He has lived abroad since 1992; his
parents and seven older brothers still live in Baghdad, but he has
not been there since 1997. Controversially, he toured America on the
eve of the Iraq war, insisting that he wanted to show another face of
Iraq and its people � their culture, art, love and poetry.
He has sidestepped questions about a possible return by saying that
he will not go back until he has something to offer, but his
assertion that 99 per cent of Iraqis have suffered in some way gives
poignancy to a song that is an unashamed eulogy to his
home: "Baghdad, you are in my blood".
Recognition beyond the Arab world has come slowly but is gathering
pace. Al-Sahir, who travels on a Canadian passport, has homes in
Canada (the home of his former wife and two adult sons), France,
Dubai and Cairo. Constantly on the move to his next concert � he came
to London from Qatar and went on the next day to Tunis � he says he
lives mostly in planes.
At one stop � the Usher Hall in Edinburgh in March � he triumphed in
the Radio 3 World Music poll, winning the North Africa and Middle
East award and then the overall audience award. "It was a tremendous
boost to my career," he acknowledges.
His travels, allied to the growing strength of the Arab diaspora,
have begun to interest Western musicians and record companies.
Earlier singers have dominated the Arab world � women such as Um
Kulthoum in Egypt and Fairuz from Lebanon, or the male virtuosos
Abdel Halim Hafez, Mohammed Abdel-Wahab and Farid Atrash. But none
tried to break into the Western market.
Now Western singers are looking to the East for something new. Sting
has pioneered co-operation with Simon Shaheen, a Palestinian American
violinist and composer, Algerian music is consolidating its hold in
France, while tourists bring Moroccan music back home with them.
Al-Sahir has taken part in international charity performances that
have been aired in Europe over the internet. He has also worked
extensively with Lenny Kravitz on anti-war protest songs, and has
recorded and toured with Sarah Brightman, drawing acclaim especially
in America, where some compare the harmonies and tonalities of Arabic
music, with their roots in Sufi mysticism, with American gospel.
Music in the Arab world has managed to evade the censure of
Islamists � with the exception of the Taleban in Afghanistan �
because the clerical authorities know there would be uproar if they
tried to ban it. Al-Sahir's songs have none of the brazen
explicitness of Western pop: and their delicate, courtly allusions to
love hark straight back to Muslim culture of the golden age.
Nevertheless, he is singing to a generation that records everything
on DVD and mobile phone. There was something exhilarating about the
fusion of East and West in the Albert Hall: women in full Islamic
hijab, swaying excitedly in the aisles as they held up their mobiles
to capture every note of the superstar. Perhaps it is the nostalgia
of exile from their home culture.
"Grown men were weeping," al-Sahir said after the concert. "They
often do that. What is it about our music that is so powerful?"
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