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Jazz seems to be hitting it big in the Arab world. |
Jazz is not something that people readily associate with the Middle East; or the rest of the Muslim world for that matter. Mention that part of the world, and sounds of racing Egyptian violin choruses or goat-skin drum rhythms come to mind. It isn’t too often that one associates Jazz greats such as Dave Brubeck, Count Basie, Charlie Parker or Duke Ellington with the Middle East. But many people forget that in its heyday, Jazz held sway throughout the world as America’s pop music. In the same way that the Michael Jackson’s and Madonna’s find a popular following overseas now, Jazz luminaries of decades past enjoyed a decent amount of recognition across the globe. Interestingly enough, that legacy of recognition continues to this day in some of the least likely places.
Saudi Swing
My first encounter with the Middle East came in 1995. A recent Muslim convert, I was interested in seeing how Islam was practiced in a fully indigenous Islamic environment. So one day on a whim I applied for a teaching position in Saudi Arabia. As God’s will would have it, I was called for an interview the very next week, and not much more than a week later was signed to a contract to teach Saudi military recruits English.
Because of economic constraints, the curriculum being taught was modeled on a back-dated program created by the Defense Language Institute (DLI) here in the United States. So dated was the material, that much of its cultural context came from 1950s and 1960s America when bobby-socks and hamburger stands were still prevalent. Pictures in books were representative of that period as were various colloquialisms and even audio clips found in the school’s listening laboratories.
It was in those listening labs though that these young Saudis were introduced to American Jazz; and they liked it.
Now mind you, these recruits did not listen to an overwhelming amount of music, let alone American music. There was one student who had a particular fascination with Gloria Estefan and the Miami Sound Machine, but he was an exception to the rule. So imagine my surprise when, shortly after popping in a listening lesson tape, heads in the classroom began bobbing and fingers began snapping.
I was a minor fan of Jazz at the time; but my interest in the genre remained limited to those Jazz greats my father had listened to when I was a boy. It so happens that the song played at the beginning of the taped lesson was unknown to me. Yet somehow it was familiar. It was quirky and strangely paced, yet it had an unmistakable swing and groove to it.
My students also had no knowledge of the artist or title of the song; but they surely knew good music when they heard it. And in an otherwise austere and severely regimented military environment, this little piece of music that preceded each of the taped audio lessons provided a much needed weekly morale boost.
So who was the mystery artist? None other than Thelonious Monk playing “Well You Needn’t”. The tune, with its experimental exploration of chord combinations and climbing scales is just the kind of thing to make a person want to move; and it doesn’t take a particular nationality to figure that out.
Nile Notes
Like many Muslims, I have been willing to, in the past, travel great distances in the hopes of finding a spouse. Some years ago my marital endeavors took me to that bustling cosmopolitan metropolis of Cairo. Heavy with humidity from the Nile, the air seemed to just sit all around me. My Arabic was not terribly good, so watching Egyptian television was not much of an option. Therefore to escape heat and boredom I took to the streets of Cairo to site see and soak up as much Egyptian culture as possible.
Music was everywhere. I expected to find music in cafes, but I was quite surprised to find that from what seemed to be almost every other car, music blared at the highest of decibel levels. Late into the night taxis and other cars would pack the streets of Cairo blasting the latest in popular Arabic music. On one occasion, I had to actually ask a cab driver to turn his music down so that I could hear myself think. Needless to say I became quite familiar with the likes of such Arabic stars as Ehab Tawfeek, Amr Diab, Diana, Ahlam and many others.
On my more subdued evenings, I had the pleasure of visiting with the family of the sister I was interested in marrying. It was during one of these visits that Jazz in the Middle East once again thrust itself to the fore.
For the most part we would just sit and talk while sipping tea. I don’t know that I’ve ever met more pleasant people. They were thoroughly engaging and they always made me feel comfortable and welcome.
So welcoming was this family that on my last visit with them, I let my guard down a bit and allowed myself to really relax as we talked. We exchanged the expected pleasantries and they asked me what my impressions of Cairo were. I proceeded to extol the virtues of Egyptian culture and explained how, on the whole, it was just a really wonderful trip. Hoping to emphasize the point, I decided to sing the chorus of Louis Armstrong’s “Wonderful World”, which at the time was very popular in some American television commercial that I have long since forgotten. I put on my best Loius Armstrong smile and did my best imitation of the Jazz great.
No sooner had I finished the chorus, members of the family started shouting “Louis Armstrong! Louis Armstrong! You know Louis Armstrong?” This family was just so taken with the music of Louis Armstrong, and the father went on to explain how he had always liked American Jazz and how he had such fond memories of seeing certain Jazz acts live in Cairo some years before.
As for me, I was simply a hit, if I do say so myself. The rest of the evening I was asked to sing as much Louis Armstrong as I possibly could. I happily obliged. I didn’t leave Egypt with a wife; but I did leave with a love of the people, some new friends and a new appreciation of just how Jazz had influenced the world music scene.
Baghdad Be-Bop
Cairo is place that one might logically think to find Jazz music. Even Saudi Arabia, with its close ties to the United States is a decent bet for Jazz’s penetration. But there are some places that one simply does not expect to find a Jazz connection. Iraq is one such place.
I visited Iraq in the summer of 1999, touring the country as part of a humanitarian fact-finding mission. The conditions were then, as they are now, desperate. Never had I seen a population so utterly devastated. Words and pictures cannot adequately convey the dire situation of the Iraqi people.
Life there is extremely hard and for the average Iraqi, struggling to make ends meet, broadening musical horizons is rather low on the list of daily priorities. But even in Iraq, Jazz has a foothold of sorts.
Consider the story of Fadhil Razooki Michael. I met him in the North of Iraq near the city of Mosul when the delegation I was with visited one of the many Christian churches in that region. It was nearing sunset and we had been to a couple other Christian sites that day and we were hoping to squeeze in one more before we had to retire for the evening. That was when we met Michael.
The caretaker of At-Tahara Church, the 74-year-old Michael approached the delegation and struck up conversation. His English was quite good and as it turned out, he had spent some time in the United States decades before when he was just a young man. First he had lived in Texas (he actually sang “The Eyes of Texas Are upon You” for the delegation) and then moved to Chicago where he worked for Down Beat magazine.
Down Beat is THE magazine for Jazz lovers. Founded back in 1934 it has chronicled Jazz from its heyday to the present. And working for such a publication at the time he would have been in Chicago, Michael would have been right in the mix of the Jazz scene. Who knows, maybe he even met or interviewed some the greats of the genre.
These days, Michael ekes out a living getting by on bread, dates and some grapes when they are available. He didn’t say whether he still enjoys Jazz, but given the circumstances, one can only assume that music isn’t a big part of his life at this point. But Jazz did touch him at one time, so much so that he wanted to work for a magazine that specialized in that music.
It never ceases to amaze me how much humans have in common. Music is one of those universal languages that can attract devotees from all walks of life from all over the world. That Jazz reached the desert where one wouldn’t expect to find it only goes to show that maybe we are all more alike than we are different. |
