Music from the Egyptian Gypsies.
This morning, we begin with the zaghareet, the joyous shout which is given by Arabic and Berber women to express their enthusiasm at festivities. With a hand for their mouth, they quickly move their tongue between the corners of their mouths which creates a lot of cheerful sounds. Even the mizmars, the Egyptian oboes, imitate these sounds every now and then in the music. All this to welcome the rerun of the series ‘The History of the Belly Dance’, which will be broadcast in January and February at the Concertzender.
This afternoon in part one, we begin with the ancient rock-carving from around 30,000 years ago which shows people who are doing ritual dances. As a prelude, six episodes will be preceded by an episode of World Minerals in style. This time, ‘Music of the Ghawazee’; the Egyptian Gypsies, who live in the area around Luxor. It seems like the music on which their women dance has not changed for centuries. "Elegant, but indecent," wrote a traveller to Cairo about their movements in the eighteenth century. To discover what was left of their traditions, American Aisha Ali went with a tape recorder to Egypt in 1973 and did fieldwork on site. Her approach was very different in comparison with the approach of the average ethnomusicologist. Aisha herself is a gifted belly dancer and teacher and… she just danced along with the Ghawazee! See also http://www.adira-suleiman.nl/ (history).
