ZIKRAYAT: Live at Lotus

Zikrayat

Live at Lotus

© 2007 Zikrayat Music (606041248229)

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Now Sounds from the Golden age of Arabic Music and Dance

tracks

1 Yamma-l-Amar Aal Baab
2 Oud Taqsim
3 Imta Hataaraf
4 Tableau from the film Ruined Honeymoon
5 Ana Albi Ilayk Mayyal
6 Ahlami
7 Nay Taqsim
8 Habbaitak Tinseet in-Nowm
9 Mawwal
10 Jayibli Salaam
11 Raqsat Karkaday
12 Drum Solo
13 Aziza
14 Raqsat Assaya

notes

Zikrayat Juxtaposes the different forms and styles of the music and dance of Egypt, Lebanon, and the greater Arab World within vivid and evocative performances, presenting authentic and original Arabic music to mainstream audiences.

A unique ensemble, Zikrayat offers the audience vibrant stage productions evoking the theatrical atmosphere and dramatic depth of classic film. With and exciting and varied repertory, including unknown gems from classic Egyptian cinema, to traditionals and standards, to original compositions, Zikrayat presents classical, folkloric, vocal, instrumental, and dance genres side-by-side, creating engaging performances that intelligently portray the variety of Arab culture

From the liner notes:

This recording is a snapshot of Zikrayat in live performance.

Zikrayat’s performances on June 23rd and 24th, 2006, at the studios of Lotus Music and Dance, realized a dream I have had for a number of years: to perform Arabic music acoustically, without amplification. Acoustic performance lets the music breathe, and brings the audience closer to the music—listeners hear the actual sounds produced by voices and instruments, rather than the sounds produced by speakers. After singing “Habbaitak Tinseet in-Nowm” on the first night, Ghaida, our principal vocalist, spontaneously expressed to the audience: “I feel so close to you without a microphone” —and you can hear that in the warmth of her singing on these recordings. We all felt an intimacy with the music and the audience on those two nights.

In this recording I tried to capture the raw feel of that live performance. It was recorded on only two microphones in stereo; so while it doesn’t have the polish of a produced studio recording, these recordings convey the depth of the room and the closeness of the audience. Listening, you can feel that Zikrayat is playing live in your room, and for those of you who love live performance and live recordings, I believe the rough, acoustic aesthetic outweighs the minor imperfections. You can hear the dancers performing and playing zagat (in the first song on the CD, Dameshe, who is dancing in this performance, answers “amma” at the end of the choruses), and you can hear the audience clapping along and responding enthusiastically. You can feel the energy of a complete song, recorded in one take, rather than broken up into different sections recorded at different times.

These shows also gave us an opportunity to incorporate music and dance in a way that we have been trying to achieve over the last year: as a theatrical stage presentation. Part of Zikrayat’s mission has been to present the classical, folk, dance, and vocal repertories of the Arab world side by side, to highlight the variety of the music as well as to unite these often-separated worlds; to show a more complete picture of the connected-ness of all of these art forms. Arab Dance, and especially what is known as “Belly Dance” or Raqs Sharqi, has often been socially denigrated in Arab, as well as American, culture, even while it is crucially important to the society and the music. Zikrayat, uniting both musicians and dancers into one performing group, seeks to place dance on a par with music, and folk music on a par with classical music, as serious artistry. Hence a stage show, which includes dance numbers—folk dances as well as theatrical Raqs Sharqi performances—and instrumental music, vocal pieces, and improvisations, all presented as varied acts within the overall, multi-faceted picture of Arabic Music.

We have been inspired in this regard especially by Arab Film, and particularly by Egyptian films from what is sometimes called the “golden age” of Egyptian musical cinema, the 1940’s, 50’s and 60’s. Much of our repertory comes from these films, and most of the well-known (and best) musicians, singers, and dancers of the 20th century, were primarily film stars. The singers Mohammed Abdel-Wahhab, Umm Kulthum, Farid al-Atrash, Esmahan, Fayza Ahmed, and Abdel-Halim Hafiz, and the dancers Naima Akif, Taheya Karioca, Samia Gamal, Nagwa Fuad, and Fifi Abdou, as well as many many others, were all huge stars in Egyptian Cinema; and no film was ever complete without a few songs or dance numbers. Hence there is an enormous repertory of film music, a small percentage of which is very well known and enormously popular throughout the Arab world, but most of which is almost totally unknown or forgotten. The word zikrayat in Arabic means “memories,” and we perform some of these forgotten gems, remembering them for our audiences.

The medium of film also presents these numbers in a dramatic context, enriching their meaning and expressive power. Placing the many wonderful dance and song numbers from the film Tamr Hinna within the film’s central story—the story of a gypsy dancer who disguises her identity to enter into high society, at the prodding of a rich suitor—gives that music more expressive power. From the opening song about “the moon” (i.e. the suitor) knocking at the door, to a song of betrayal, to a final dance piece in which all of the deception is revealed, every dance, every song, has a different character and dramatic role. One of our eventual goals is to take some of the best of these films and present all of the music and dance numbers from them as complete, semi-dramatic shows. In a way, Zikrayat is somewhere in-between a variety show and a musical theater company.

These performances at Lotus were a first step in that direction. I have selected the best pieces from both nights, and tried to arrange them into a coherent show, for listeners interested in hearing the CD from beginning to end and getting a picture of the diversity (and continuity) within a Zikrayat live performance. I hope you enjoy!

--Sami Abu Shumays, Director of Zikrayat

reviews

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  • Zikrayat - Live at Lotus
    author: Larry Hatchett

    I saw this featured on bhuz.com and came over here for a listen - thanks for that feature on cdbaby, by the way! Well, I liked it so much I bought 3 copies! The recording quality imparts the live feeling of the performance, the vocalist is superb, and there is nary a misstep by anyone in the group - a tough thing to pull off. Highly recommended!

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