The Magic of the Music – March 2006
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Several Years ago I had a very special lunch with a very special man. His name was Ibrahim Farrah, known affectionately to most as “Bobby”. I had just moved back to Canada after living and working in Europe for many years and I was thrilled to have the good fortune to arrive just in time for his workshop in Vancouver. It had been too long since I had had the chance to dance with my esteemed teacher and I was really happy to not only have a class with him but also to have the chance to visit with him over lunch. We caught up with each other’s news, changes, plans and dreams over the past few years. Then he asked me how it felt to be in class again and get some inspiration after having to teach others all the time. I laughed and asked him if he had not noticed my radiant smile, as I had flown around his class for the past two days having the absolute time of my life. I assured him how fabulous it was to be in class with him again and how he had never ceased to inspire me and countless others throughout his entire career. Suddenly I stopped, looked at him and asked “But Bobby, who do you take class with for your inspiration? Who inspires you?” He gave me his broad, big lipped grin and croaked out. “The music – Hadia. My inspiration comes from the music”. I never forgot his words and I see him smiling at me every time I have the good fortune to hear a piece of oriental music that takes my heart away and makes my body want to fly.
I remember the day that I first stumbled into a belly dance class with absolutely no idea of what awaited me. My Danish car insurance adjuster – dance teacher welcomed us all, put her favourite record in the player and had us all shoulder rolling, step touching and hip circling. I had never heard anything quite like the music that she was playing and I didn’t particularly have a reaction to it except to think that it was weird. However, a year down the road I was addicted to Music of the Qaria and Ghawazee. I was an ETHNIC belly dancer (the original tribal) and proud of it! When someone played Aziza for me I just looked at the record player and wondered what in the world anyone would do to that and also why they would want to do anything to it, but drums and mizmars were the BOMB and why not throw in some snaky-type droning stuff too!
But slowly over the years my ear evolved, as did my dancing and my appreciation for and understanding of the Middle Eastern Dance Arts and music. Ahmad Jarjour of Montreal, Nadia Gamal and Bobby in New York not only inspired in me, but shared with me their deep love of Oriental Dance. Their sensual, soft and sometimes strong movements and brilliant choreographies embodied the intricacies, complexities and dynamics of oriental music. The more I heard it and moved to it, the more I loved it and the more I began to understand it. I remember how exhilarating it was to begin to feel the instruments of the taqsim and anticipate the moment that they resolved into the call and answer game of drum and instrument and finally how they all met in the middle to break open the powerful drums of the Baladi Eshra. Although I adored Abdel Halin Hafiz and Farid al Atrache, I have to admit that Oum Kalthoum and Mohamed Abdel Wahab were a bit beyond my sensitivity level until I had actually traveled, studied and worked in the Middle East and North Africa. Watching the Egyptian dancers with their orchestras gave me an entirely different understanding and consequential approach to the relationship between music and dance. The opportunity to work with professional Arabic musicians in their countries and later in Europe was perhaps the best education that I could have had in my career. Before that I had worked with musicians in North America, but most of the music had been popular songs, dabkes, or Americanized Middle Eastern.
However, at the same time that I began to learn and understand the beauty of oriental dance music, I also began to notice that I was hearing the same songs over and over again and that much of the “new” music was merely the re-recording of the old favourite classics from the “golden age” of Egyptian dance. Where was the new music? I know that the Arabic mentality loves the familiar, unlike the relentless Western need for new and different, but I found that I had to search harder and further to find new tunes and that would fuel my inspiration.
With the trend towards Shaabi, which began with Ahmed Adawiya and became firmly installed in the Egyptian oriental dance performance by Dina, the beloved Taksim Baladi or Baladi Eshra, with its roots in the popular urban dance of the Egyptian people, has become a thing of the past. Many younger dancers do not even know what this is, or how to dance to its components. Then began the scourge of the synthesizer! Even Setrak, whose original recordings were very inspirational and played on REAL Oriental instruments, began pumping out mass-produced synthesized generic music complete with canned tablas and Zaghareets.
As belly dancing madness began to seize the world, Drum Boxes and synthesizers ruled and our beautiful oriental music was left behind in the dust of the Modern Egyptian Pop Machine. Last year, my hero, Mona al Said, taught two days of workshops using only canned pop music. Well into the second day of class, I asked her why she was not working with any of her amazing and wonderful oriental pieces which had been composed, played and recorded just for her, during her years as a prima dancer in Egypt. She replied that we must be modern and keep up with the times. I disagreed, as did so many others in the class. Newer and more modern is NOT always better, especially in the arts. When we replace something marvelous, something rich and something that touches one’s soul, with a machine, we loose something precious. Because this pop music has little else to interpret except the lyrics, dancers have become overly focused on these. It is very helpful to understand the meaning of these pop tunes in order to stay within the sentiment, but hardly necessary to pantomime and mouth one’s way through an entire song. In fact it is always easy to spot the foreigners as they try to be more Egyptian than the Egyptians, singing and lip syncing their way through every word. Personally, I love a GOOD Modern Egyptian pop song and find them to be perfect vehicles for simple beginner class choreographies, or just for having fun at parties. But once my students reach an intermediate level I do my best to work with more classical music, so that they can learn how to hear, feel and interpret the instruments, the rhythms, the intricate phrasing and the maqams. For advanced students, it is imperative to understand the lyrics of Oum Kalthoum in order to be able to properly interpret the song.
So where IS all the classical oriental dance music and why is it so hard to find? As in every other field, the demand dictates the supply. If we are not selective and rush out to purchase every piece of pop, fusion, and synthesized Belly Dance music on the market, the producers will not be required to pay the extra money required to hire REAL MUSICIANS who play REAL INSTRUMENTS. This is expensive. This is especially true in Egypt, since certain foreigners who did not take the time to study the market and understand the business conceded to pay much higher prices than normal for their recordings. Once the higher price was paid, it immediately became the new price and now these prices are beyond the reach of those who previously recorded great music there. Even some of the newer Egyptian oriental music that combines a couple of traditional instruments with synthesizers and offer us some lovely and inspiring compositions, lack that unique and powerful solid support of the big Egyptian percussion sections, as one lonely drummer tries to hold up entire piece by himself. It is interesting, nice to listen to, good for studies in choreography but it doesn’t make me want to dance.
On my eternal quest for great oriental dance music, I will not buy a CD unless I can hear it and unless it inspires both my head and my heart. I am very demanding, in fact, I am the first one to call myself a music snob. I would also rather pay a higher price for a really inspiring CD with traditional musicians and some oomph than buy a basket of the mass produced pop, synthesized and techno CDs on the market. I can also dance very happily to one of these great pieces for years, as I continue to discover and explore the many nuances hidden behind the surface and continue to find inspiration into new and different movements and patterns within my dance.
I would like to invite my fellow dancers to demand a bit more of our current market and perhaps, even demand the return of the Arabic instrument and the full Egyptian percussion section. After all if you don’t ask you will never receive.
I am very grateful to Jalilah and Pirahna Music who continue to record consistently excellent recordings of Egyptian and now Lebanese classical oriental music with complete orchestras who play the traditional Arabic instruments. Sahra Saeedah has three very nice CDs with her Egyptian band. I was fortunate to work in Germany with Mohamed Ali and his orchestra and their CD, 1002 Nachts is indeed brilliant, although very difficult to find. Some Peko recordings with The Cairo Orchestra contain some beautiful pieces. Suhaila’s Vol 1 has a nice rerecording of Mona al Said’s music. The old classics, Samarah with Setrak and Belly Dance Non Stop with Nagwa Foud, are both wonderful on all tracks.