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Arab Music: Dark Days for the 'Light of the Heart'
Jim Motavalli describes his discovery of Arab music with heart.

By Jim Motavalli

The first Arab music I heard was in its native habitat, while riding on gaudily painted buses through Turkey, Morocco or Syria in the 1960s. Before the drivers thrashed their busted-out transmissions into second gear, they were popping in cassettes of Lebanon-born Fairouz or Egypt’s Oum Khalsoum, the sirens who serenaded the entire Arab world.

The propulsive beat went with the bad roads, wild driving, and free-form mix of human and animal passengers. Even the chickens, tied together at the feet, seemed to sway in time. The singing was rich and highly emotive, but what really captured me was the hypnotic pulse of the oud, the Arab lute. With its short neck and deep body, the 10- to 12-string, plucked oud looks like a sawed-off, overweight guitar, but its origins—it might have originally been Sumerian, Egyptian, Persian or even Jewish—are shrouded in mystery.

It was certainly the Arabs who popularized the oud, and placed it front and center in a musical tradition that was, until recently, best appreciated in America as the soundtrack to bellydancing. But its potential for crossover appeal was soon apparent in the west. Like rock, Middle Eastern music—in infinite variations ranging from exuberant Algerian räi and Egyptian shabbi to meditative qwalli from Pakistan—had a good beat and you could dance to it. In Arabic, the word "tarab" means state of ecstasy or enchantment, and it's what the best musicians try to capture. Small wonder, then, that LP copies of Port Said: Exotic Rhythms of the Middle East Captured in High Fidelity, Music on the Desert Road or The Seventh Veil brightened the otherwise drab scenery in many a 1950s suburban rec room.

John Berberian, an accomplished Armenian oud player from New York, helped penetrate the consciousness of the Woodstock generation with Middle Eastern Rock, a 1969 fusion album that included studio pro Joe Beck on "amplified rock guitar and fuzz." But Berberian, who still plays around New York and Boston, was 30 years ahead of his time.

Peter Gabriel’s World of Music, Arts and Dance (WOMAD) tours, launched in 1982, helped make Arab music "cool," particularly by presenting young artists like the London-based Transglobal Underground, which mixes dance beats, tape loops and samples into a world music stew. Also helping the crossover, and performing on WOMAD, was the onetime "Top of the Pops" performer Natacha Atlas, a self-described "human Gaza strip"of a singer and bellydancer who is half English, half Sephardic Jew and raised in a Moroccan community in Brussels.

It is, arguably, sad that Arab music has to be adulterated with pop influences to be palatable to western audiences, but the artists themselves—many of whom live in France or the U.S. are enthusiastic participants. Khaled, the Algerian räi singer who is among the most popular Arab performers in the U.S., rocks it up with production help from British progressive rocker Steve Hillage. Cheb Mami, another räi star, goes into the studio with producer Nile Rodgers to record "Le Räi C'est Chic."

Aside from Peter Gabriel, the rocker with the biggest influence on Arab music is Sting, who was introduced to räi by his manager, Miles Copeland. In 2000, Sting recorded the song "Desert Rose"as a duet with Cheb Mami, and toured with him. The song, which even made it into a Jaguar commercial, was a huge hit, and the collaborations continued. That's Sting singing backup on "Le Räi C'est Chic,"and the rocker's endorsement is stickered on many a current Arab music album.

Just a few months ago, there was considerable optimism that Arab music would crossover in a big way, like Latin pop, country, cajun, or any number of other styles. As producer and kanun player Ara Topouzian points out, movie soundtracks—from The Crow and Dead Man Walking to Gladiator—use the duduk, an Armenian wooden flute, for a taste of the exotic, and pop stars from Gloria Estefan to the Colombian singer Shakira give Joe Zeytoonian a call when they want some oud on her records.

But then September 11 happened.

Dawn Elder, vice president of Miles Copeland's label, Ark 21/Mondo Melodiya, knows just where she was when she heard about the World Trade Center attacks. "I was in Egypt, on my way to the airport with 18 musicians about to embark on an almost sold-out 10-city U.S. tour with Khaled and Hakim, whos known as the Sheik of Egyptian Shaabi,"she says. "It was stunning, surreal. Obviously, the tour had to be canceled."

Simon Shaheen, who lives in Brooklyn and is one of the world’s foremost oud players, was getting ready for a September 22 gig at the Chicago Music Festival. In his case, the show went on, to standing ovations, but Shaheen, who was born in Galilee and educated in Jerusalem, says many of the musicians he works with regularly have had trouble getting visas since September 11. "This horrible event has nothing to do with Arab music or musicians," he says. The Taliban, of course, banned all music, even though Shaheen points out that the Qu'ran calls music "the light for the heart." Islam, he adds, "supports many artistic and cultural ideas."

Instead of hiding after September 11, Shaheen, who was nominated for no less than 11 first-ballot Grammies for his crossover album Blue Flame, went on "Politically Incorrect"to, as he puts it, "talk about American foreign policy. I think U.S. needs to put pressure on the repressive Arab regimes it supports. These countries have to let the people breathe and express themselves."

Levantine Dreams

Many Middle Eastern musicians are Armenian or Lebanese Christians, or non-Arab Turkish Moslems, or even Greek. The problem, of course, is that Americans have trouble telling Arabs apart even from turban-wearing Sikhs, so they’re unlikely to appreciate fine political distinctions of the type Shaheen makes. Arab music can sound like an ecstatic expression of deep humanism, or it can be perceived as the soundtrack to terrorism.

Many concerts were canceled after September 11, and live Arab music almost disappeared from New York. (Sadly enough, the club scene in Dearborn and Detroit, home to the largest Arab population outside the Middle East, had died out long before that.) According to DJ Addis Pace, many New York clubs that had featured Arab dance music stopped spinning it after the World Trade Center attacks. Middle Eastern restaurants closed, too.

Moroccan oud player Brahim Fribgane, who now lives in Arizona, was part of Boston's tight-knit Arab music community on September 11. Fribgane, a regular with Hassan Hakmoun's ensemble who has toured with Peter Gabriel and recorded with Morphine, was numbed by the attacks. "For the first few days, I couldn’t play at all,"Fribgane says. "I just didn’t feel the same. I had to break through this idea that I couldn't play music because I'm an Arab. But on September 14 I had a gig in Boston with Atlas Soul, a UN-type of North African funk band with a Jewish-French sax player, a German drummer and a Greek bass player, and I found I could perform again."

Fribgane, a regular at Jewish weddings and bar mitzvahs, hates the idea that his music could in any way be associated with hate or terrorism, and he thinks—he hopes—that it can be seen as a healing force. "Music is about love and peace, right?" he says.

That view is common among Middle Eastern musicians and producers. Dawn Elder calls September 11 "a setback, a step backward" for Arab music, after a cover story in Billboard ("Arabic Music Moves West") and big spreads in the Los Angeles Times and Rhythm magazine. "We were waylaid. But this awful time has also reinspired me to spread the word about this music," she says. "It's not just about having a good time or a great cultural experience. It’s truly a much-needed healing force."

Shaheen expresses the hope that Americans will want to learn more about Middle Eastern culture “because of this event that happened.” Shaheen is himself an educator, lecturing regularly about the music at colleges and workshops. He is the founder of the Arab American Arts Institute, which organizes an annual Arabic Music Retreat at Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts.

Kay Campbell, banker by day and oud player by night, helps administer the retreat, which brings together amateur and professional musicians from around the world. "After I saw 'Lawrence of Arabia'and heard all that wonderful music, I knew what I wanted to do with my life," Campbell says.

Campbell says she could sense "a door opening" before September 11, that "people from all over were getting into the groove of Arab music. The attacks were, obviously, devastating to the progress we were making. There is seething and justifiable anger. But this is also an opportunity to educate people about this culture that has fabulous music, great food, wonderful poetry and true joie de vivre."

And reports of the death of Arab music in America appear to be premature. DJ Addis Pace, who doubles as the head world music buyer at a major New York record chain, says, "This has been a very robust year for Arab music, and we were very worried about a backlash after the attacks. But it hasn't happened. Sales have maintained. Four of our top five world music sellers right now have a connection to the Middle East. I guess people want to understand that part of the world."

Fabian Alsultany, manager of the Moroccan Gnawa virtuoso Hassan Hakmoun, welcomes the cross-pollination among world performers that has opened wide arms to Arabic music. Hakmoun, a WOMAD veteran with long dreadlocks, lives with singer Paula Cole, played at Woodstock '94 and appeared on the "Late Show with David Letterman"with David Sanborn. Alsultany is himself half Iraqi and half Cuban, so crossing over is natural to him. Alsultany also DJs in New York, and he says people are still asking for Natacha Atlas, and such unique fusions as MoMo, an electronic band from Morocco, and Badawi, Israeli desert music with a reggae dub overlay. "This was the big year," says AlSultany. "After Cheb Mami recorded 'Desert Rose' with Sting, everything exploded. September 11 has stigmatized everything with a Moslem connection, so we need to be out there with a positive message."

The crossover music is so strong, and so popular, that it threatens to swamp the modest movement that is attempting to preserve traditional Arab performers. Perhaps surprisingly, John Berberian, despite his having given birth to the first Middle Eastern fusion album, is frequently cited by traditionalists as the oud player with the truest sense of "kef,"or Armenian soul. "He's my favorite, and he's still very highly regarded,"says Ara Topouzian, who has released more than 30 CDs of Arabic roots music on the American Recording Productions label.

Berberian, now living in Massachusetts after many years in New York and New Jersey, is still doing what he has always done, playing ethnic club dates, performing at Armenian and Greek dances, parties, weddings and anniversaries. "I'm still working,"he says. "I can't say September 11 has affected me all that much. One club where I play, the Middle East in Cambridge, suspended operation for a couple of weeks. The name above the door was not very attractive for a while. But they're back in commission."

Most Middle Eastern musicians are hoping that they'll have a similar experience. A pause to reflect and heal, then back to the seriously peaceful business of making music that is 'a light for the heart.'

Jim Motavalli is a Connecticut-based editor and writer. His features have appeared in The New York Times, The Nation, The Boston Globe, The Hartford Courant, Salon, Grist, Cars.com, The Guardian, Advocate, Boston Phoenix, Inside Media, New Country Music and Blueswire, among other publications. Motavalli hosts a bi-weekly public affairs and music radio show on listener-supported WPKN-FM in Bridgeport, Conn. He teaches journalism at Fairfield University.

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