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CairoScene
22-07-2025
- Entertainment
- CairoScene
SceneNoise x Hiya Dialogues: Sabine Salamé
Introduction by Riham Issa Interview conducted by Shirine Saad In a time where artists lmostly focus on building a certain visual identity, scavenging after digital recognition in the form of views, streams and shares, Sabine Salamé - a Lebanese street rap artist and revolutionary songwriter - favours the shadows of the underground hip-hop scene. For her, making music was never about creating short-term content to spoon-feed her audience, but rather crafting active dialogues with current political issues to build a real historical documentation of a region that's perpetually struggling for liberation from patriarchal and colonial powers. Despite her expansive discography in the rap scene, Sabine refuses to be labelled as 'rapper', nor translate her Arabic lyrics in any other language to accommodate the West. She sees her music as spoken words that happen to be influenced by her roots, the Beirut hip-hop scene, and Gazal. Growing up imbued with the classical music of Fairuz, Sabah and Asmahan, Sabine first approached making music through writing, mainly poems, as a means of self-expression. She then turned to journalism as a form of activism, but it wasn't until she first discovered the underground hip-hop community live that she was inspired to venture into rap in an attempt to escape censorship and radically express her opinions. Although her rap career began spontaneously, her unapologetic verses, dark, satirical and politically-charged, rendered her one of the most influential rap artists in the region who is actively persevering the gritty and raw essence of Arabic hip-hop. Her music and improvised performances, often tackling issues of immigration and political injustice, traversed borders and garnered her a loyal following across Europe. In this new episode of SceneNoise x Hiya Dialogues, Lebanese journalist and DJ Shirine Saad speaks with Sabine about decolonizing music and how her sound evolved into what it is today. Sabine also reflects on the prime time of the Beirut rap scene, her career in journalism, and activism in the Arab world and its diaspora. SceneNoise x Hiya Dialogues is a series conducted by Shirine Saad, highlighting radical feminist voices and influential artists from the SWANA underground scene, who are actively engaging with historical revolutionary movements to challenge the cis-heteropatriarchal and capitalist structures within the industry through their art, music, and poetry. Shirine: Part of my personal project is to follow a train of thought that is not Western-centric, including musical language, or practising hearing in a way that is not Western-centric. Is this part of your practice as well? Sabine: Yeah, it is just that. I write in Arabic, and a lot of people ask me why I don't translate my songs. But a lot of them don't translate easily because I use a lot of metaphors, and there's a lot of play in words. Additionally, when you think in a language that is so big and wide, such as Arabic, where even the thought process and the meaning of things is different - you know, in Arabic, you have like a hundred thousand ways to say one thing, and then you have one word that means a hundred different things, and it's funny. I can try to translate some concepts within my music, or explain what I talk about here and there, but it's literally impossible to translate something that carries all these feelings, metaphors, and plays on words. Shirine: Yeah, that's so interesting, but do you feel that your audience in Europe can connect to your music in a profound way? Sabine: That's an interesting question… well, my Arabic-speaking audience for sure. I think people in the diaspora, especially in what I'd call the recent diaspora, who maybe grew up in their countries and had to leave in their adulthood - these people understand my music the most, because I'm mainly talking about these kinds of subjects and themes in my music. What's interesting, actually, is that people who don't usually understand Arabic come to me - and this happens a lot - and tell me I didn't understand what you were saying, but I could feel some of the energy and the feelings in this or that song. I think that's quite beautiful as well, that people who don't necessarily understand the words, but get some of the emotions that are there. I think that's powerful. Shirine: From your perspective, what are some of those feelings that this group of people connect with, and are they the same kind of feelings as they are for Arabs? Sabine: Yeah… well, I can't really speak for the non-Arabs because each person has their own takeaways from my music. I think a lot of what people understand and get from my performances is that there's a specific anger that is present in a lot of my lyrics and the way I deliver the songs. I think that's something that they can grasp without actually having to understand what I'm talking about; they can understand the feelings of sadness or nostalgia without necessarily having to understand the words I'm saying. Because when you write, it is different from when you rap or perform on stage - you're not just writing something, and then reciting it. There's also the effect of the sound that exists, so it's not just words - there's also a lot of feelings and things carried within the sound waves themselves. You know, the music that exists within the tone of your voice, like when someone's voice breaks, you can tell they are breaking. Shirine: How do you feel about that - that people can connect with these emotions, considering what's going on in the world right now? There are wars and genocide in many countries in the region, fascist governments rising, refugee movements in Spain, and women's rights movements… a lot of these topics you address directly or indirectly in your work. Do you feel that you can speak to people from different backgrounds and experiences through these themes in your music? Sabine: First of all, I would like to address the concept of these issues of 'right now' because I don't think that these issues are issues of right now, you know. I think these are issues that have always existed for the past 400 to 500 years, and they are inherently at the heart of this imperial, colonial and capitalist world that we live in. For capitalism and imperialism to function, you need to have genocide, racism, and immigration. Also, immigration is a form of resources - we are part of these resources that the West steal from what they call poor countries. And, they are poor countries because the West is stealing their resources. They are creating chaos and not allowing us to actually create our own independent governments that allow us to profit from our own resources, but also allow us to build communities. I think this is a problem everywhere in the world, but it has one name, you know, it's capitalist colonial imperialism. It's the same system everywhere in the world, committing genocides, ecocides and forcing people outside of their homes and communities, and ethnically cleansing populations. People think that colonisation stopped happening years ago, but that is not true. The only thing that changes is the branding. So, I don't like that narrative of 'what's going on right now in the world', because even the genocide of the Palestinian people didn't start on October 7th. The Nakba happened more than 70 years ago, and there are refugee camps for Palestinians everywhere across the globe, people who were not allowed to return to their homeland even before that. And, this is something that has also been happening for over 400 years in other regions of the world - what happened in Palestine, happened in North America as well. Until today, the native population of the United States of America lives in segregated camps and reservations. Although I like the idea that people in the US are becoming more aware of this idea of colonisation, I think they should start from the oppression that is going on in their own country first. Shirine: How do you see the connection between your work and the history of hip-hop, how it came out in Jamaica with turntables, then migrated to New York, and the Bronx, where it lived in this sense of alienation, with people mixing records in the streets sometimes even without a mic? Sabine: It's not just hip-hop, but also jazz and blues and actually all of the music that exists today in the United States is music that has been appropriated from black culture and communities. Similarly, in Spain, there's an appropriation of music that comes from South America. This is why I don't like to say I am a rapper, because I'm not part of that culture as well. I do create rap sometimes, it's part of what I do, but it's also spoken word, and there's a lot of influence in my work from things from my own culture, which is Gazal. I have a lot of influence from it, in the way I perform. I try to bring that into my work, into something that is also from a community that I can't really talk about, because I didn't live it. So, I don't even like to claim that label - I don't do hip-hop anyway - I am not part of the hip-hop culture. I love it, but the music that I make and sing and perform to, a lot of it comes from the people of our region. Surely, they have influences from hip-hop, from a lot of different music scenes, but it also has a lot of influences from our own history and heritage. Shrinie: Can you tell me about the music you were listening to growing up at home, and how you first started thinking about your own sound, lyrics and words, because you are a poet as well, right? Sabine: Growing up, I never actually thought that I would rap, much less be involved in music. I liked music in general, but I think I got into it mostly because of my mom - she used to take us to jazz concerts, my brother and I, when we were kids. I used to just listen to a lot of our [classical] music, like Fairuz, Sabah, Asmahan, these kinds of stuff, but I also grew up listening to a lot of hip-hop and rap. The aspect of writing was part of music when it came to me. I liked poetry a lot, and I started writing very early on, when I was like 11 years old. It was kind of a way for me to express myself, because I always found it so hard to express myself growing up–I'm getting better at it now. I've gone a long way working on myself. But it was really hard for me to admit how I feel. So, this is when I turned to writing. I needed to express these feelings somewhere, so I started writing them down into these little poems. That just stuck with me, the poetry part. Then later on, I became a journalist and started writing bigger pieces, and the poetry became something that was just for me and myself. This was up until one of my friends suggested, 'Why don't you start writing rap?', because we didn't have any female rappers in Lebanon at the time. So, I literally started off like that, like a joke in a way, and then it suddenly developed into something. I did it once, and then sent it to that friend of mine. He sent it to everyone, and I started getting a lot of push and support from a lot of guys in the scene. Everyone was like 'yeah, let's go. We need you in here,' and so on. It was kinda like that, but I really felt that it added another layer to the poetry aspect. It is nice when I write it down, but also when I say it out loud, it gives it a different kind of power in a way. Shirine: Tell me about the rap community in Beirut at that time. How did it influence you, and how did you feel about it? Sabine: When I was still living in Beirut in my late teenage and early twenties, I think it was a really nice time. I got to live through a lot of events, and I got to see this rap culture kind of begin. For me, it was really important the period when we had the scene split in half; you had the guys who rapped in Arabic, and then the ones who rapped in English. And, each Wednesday, there was a group of them in Radio Beirut at the time, and I used to go there all the time, and listen to them. It was such a precious time, and there was way more space for everyone than now. It is really nice now as well; the scene is growing in a sense where there are more rappers, and a lot of really talented guys coming out and doing really nice work. I love what they are doing. But, I feel like they have fewer places to just exist, come together, create and experiment. Back in the day, you had like two or three bars with little stages, where the guys could just hop on and just like you know, do random stuff. To me, what was really inspirational was what Mazen [El Rass] was doing at that time. I remember when I discovered him, I was walking down the streets in Beirut and saw a poster of Adam, Darwin & El Batreek - It was the artwork for the album that he did with Homa -and, I was like, 'Okay, let's go and see what this is', and I went to that concert. I remember I was completely mind-blown because I heard a lot of the guys before rapping, which was most of the time very much superficial and inspired by the West - you know, flexing or dissing each other. But when I listened to Mazen, his music was filled with all these political subjects and very rich themes, and I felt really inspired that there was a space for me to write something like that. Mind you, I was a journalist at the time, and I had a problem with journalism, which was that I was always being extremely edited and extremely censored. There were a lot of things I wasn't allowed to say. That really frustrated me. And then, I saw that guy [El Rass] hop on stage, basically doing a form of journalism as well, in the way that he tells you the story and the images he evokes. There was a lot there that was also informative, and a lot of events that he was documenting through his music as well. Shirine: The scene was also important at the time, because it brought together people from different communities, and it was responding to what was going on in Palestine and Syria, etc. I was wondering how you felt about joining the scene as a woman - I guess it was about 10 years ago? Sabine: Yeah... well, back then I wasn't rapping. I was just someone who enjoyed rap music, and it was fine being a woman in that context, because I was like an audience member, you know. But later on, when I started rapping, I felt like it became a bit different. A lot of the guys started treating me differently as well, like I was there to compete with them or something. At the time, I realised that there are a lot of little kingdoms there, rather than one community in the Lebanese rap scene, which made me very sad. This is something that has exhausted me for the last three years. I have been trying to change that and bring people together to create some sort of community. But then, when I do an event, if people from the scene come, I feel like they often come to size me up. I feel like this is something that has to do with the music scene in general, and how it is in Lebanon. There aren't a lot of opportunities, so everybody feels like they have to step on the other person to make it - there's a lot of competition. It makes me sad because I feel like a lot of the support that I got from a lot of people in the scene was in a superficial sense, because I am a 'woman' or 'talented'. You feel that people are nice to you on the surface because you have something to offer, but they don't really try to build anything with you. Unless they see that as part of something that they are gonna profit from. But Beirut has always been a place that's really vicious, and now I feel like it's a place where people kinda have to take advantage of others and be vicious themselves, in order to survive. Shirine: I think that the problem is not only the scarcity in the local scene, but also the music scene in the region at large. A lot of people feel that to become part of the Gulf music scene, they have to have a commercial sound and use auto-tune, for example. And, for women, there's a lot of pressure to perform femininity in so many ways, and you're really moving away from that and keeping it very raw in your style, sound and performance. So, it's not only because you're a woman or in the spoken-word rap scene, I think you have so much to say. However, there are not a lot of spaces where people can understand what you say, because so many people are now accustomed to a certain commercial sound. Sabine: Yeah, I agree that people are accustomed to a certain sound, but also, I don't think it's the problem of the people; it's because the platforms that exist and the media that are in power don't offer them anything else. I'm sure a lot of people in Lebanon would love what I do if they knew about it, but like, how are they going to know about it? Because if I don't do the typical stuff that the industry expects of me, then I'm not going to get a push from the industry itself. It's actually ironic because the reason I went into music and writing was because I was very alienated as a child, only to find myself even more alienated in the music scene. This is quite sad. People would rather listen to something that is borrowed, fake and has no soul, rather than support artists who are doing something original. One thing that I find a bit hard to accept nowadays is the idea that we are expected to be influencers as well. Yeah, I love the music that I make, and I love making music because I want to hear this kind of music, and there's not enough female voices doing that s**t, and being hard, raw, and authentic. But, at the same time, when I do it, I feel like people are not really listening or pushing it. At the same time, I feel that now you have to be a TikTok star to make it as a musician, but I didn't start making music, so I stand in front of the camera and try to do this or that, and engage you with really short-term content. I feel like this is really killing music in a sense, because you have these insanely famous artists, like right now, the Arab-Americans who are even more famous than Arab artists, and you have Arab artists that are insane and putting a lot of work into their stuff, and they are giving proper content. And then you have these TikTok artists who are putting out stuff like 20-second songs, and they are even more famous because they are playing the algorithm game. These American artists are the ones getting pushed - I call them Americans because they are Arabs who grew up in the United States, who are literally Americans, and they have no connections. Even Palestinian Americans only started talking about Palestine five minutes ago. Before that, they were just making sexy music, and now they are spearheading the whole Palestinian movement. They are now riding on this wave to make themselves famous, while artists and musicians in Palestine are eating dirt. I feel that this aspect is very sad because it tells you a lot about the way that we consume music, and the word 'consume' here is very important, because this is what music has become now, it is just another thing to consume, whereas before that it had a lot of different functions that were good and others bad. It used to be a means of resistance in a lot of places, like we said before about how hip-hop started as a means of resistance. But, now it is just something to consume, whitewashed - another aspect of capitalism and destruction. Yes, music should be something that's for resistance, but it doesn't mean it necessarily is, because in a lot of places it is now being used as a distraction, and a way to fetishise certain ideas. There's just a lot of performative activism within music itself, now. Most people who now listen to music about Palestine are mainly listening to an American rapper in the diaspora talking about the Palestinian struggle, not actual Palestinian artists. Yeah, music has the capacity to be a form of resistance, but it is also being used against us. Now, it's more important for us to be out there, rather than being in here, creating. I feel like we've reached a point where making music is pointless. To me, right now, making music is not resistance. I am not resisting with my music. I'm just making music, making sounds to make myself feel better. To me, resistance right now is actually disrupting, going on the streets, trying to stop these big corporations and stop their weapons from going there. This is resistance, a direct action right there. I'm sick of hearing that music is a means of resistance, no, shut the f*** up. Unless you're a Palestinian musician living in Palestine, or like a Palestinian refugee, really suffering from the occupation in one way or another. Then, your music is not resistance. It is just a side quest for this resistance. Shirine: As you said yourself, often, musicians and poets are saying things that aren't being said anywhere else - they are speaking the truth that is not on TV, newspapers or in history books. And, your music is directly more political than a lot of the music that is coming out of the region at the moment. Certainly, in the region, there's so much censorship in terms of the music industry, but there is still a connection, though, between the streets and the music that is coming out of the underground. I think it's a dialogue and not isolated. Sabine: For sure, you still have the underground artists, and those artists in the streets, there's a form of resistance in that sense. I was talking specifically about the Western musicians who are profiting from all of that music-washing. But if you look at the underground scene in the Egyptian music scene, you see entire subcultures of young rappers who are making music that's very authentic and poetic – these guys are piss poor making that music. It's the same in Lebanon; you have these guys making music with literally zero money, and really trying to create. To me, that's definitely part of the culture, and their music is what pushes the culture. But you are never going to see these artists on big stages or garnering hundreds of thousands of views. You are never going to see them at Coachella, or whatever. Shirine: Elhamdullah! The space for free expression is very limited. There is this idea of constant repression. We are being repressed by the industry and the government, in the underground and in the streets. Like, in Beirut, you're always scared that the police are going to show up, and the same in Egypt. Sabine: Yeah, in Egypt, I know this exists because I worked with Egyptian artists, and basically, they have to censor themselves. I had this conversation a lot with Ma-Beyn; we did a project together with SHLTF, the Palestinian producer. It's a three-track EP called 'Nahas'. Mariam and I had discussions about this endlessly, because she also comes from a family that's half Palestinian, and her dad is an activist. So, Ma-Beyn is very careful about what she writes, and I'm the complete opposite of that. I went into rap, so I don't censor myself. But I do understand her as well, because if she said one word wrong, then her entire life would be gone. She's aware that she can't say all that she wants to, but at the same time, she still tries to say something. That makes for a lot of creative ways that she actually writes in. To me, it's exhausting trying to do that, because I can't write a text thinking of how every word can affect every person in the country. I have the privilege of writing what I want, but that doesn't mean I'm more rebellious than her; I just have a privilege at the end of the day. I can get away with things more. Shirine: That was really a stunning album. Can you tell me how it came together, and how the two of you met, and started collaborating with SHLTF? Sabine: We found out that we started making music around the same time. We met online first. Someone sent her my song, '3lby b alb 3lby', with the animated video. She loved that song and contacted me, saying, 'Hey, I want to make music with you', and sent me her latest release at that time. I liked her music and vibes. So, we started working together. That was like two years ago or so in [2022]. We actually started working on a track that we didn't end up making at the end. At the same time, I also met SHLTF online. He lives in Lebanon, I was living here in Barcelona, and Mariam was in Cairo. So, this album was very centred on the number three: three continents, three countries, and three peoples with three identities. Lebanese, Syrian and Egyptian. We also went with three tracks, where each title consisted of three letters. Essentially, what happened is that SHLTF sent me a beat for 'Hawa' first, and I showed it to Ma-Beyn, and she was like, 'Oh, this is really nice, let's hop on it together.' So, then I talked to him, and he said that he wants to drop the track as part of a solo EP with no lyrics on it. I was like, 'No, let's do the EP together.' So, we started working on 'Hawa'; we actually wrote the whole song remotely, and then I went to Egypt. Within the course of three or four days, we wrote the two other songs and recorded and filmed the videos. It was done in a very short period of time, and I'm really proud of this project because it doesn't sound like anything out there, it has a really nice vibe, and our different styles complement each other very well. For me, it's an important and precious project because we talked about us being women in the music scene, and naturally, we ended up talking about Palestine, because the Israeli attacks on Gaza had just escalated at the time. It was also a way for us to really connect these different places that are part of identities, but separated through colonialism. To us, 'NHS' was this kind of bridge between Egypt, Syria, Palestine, and Lebanon. That's why I was very adamant about putting in the sentence, we say a lot in the street here, which is 'من غزة لبيروت شعب واحد ما بيموت', and we changed it up a bit to 'من مصر لبيروت شعب واحد ما بيموت'. During the process, we also talked a lot about the idea of, like, how my grandmother used to hop on a train when she was a kid and go all the way to Egypt. I feel it is really cruel for this to be taken away from us, and we never get to experience that, even though we have a lot more in common than what separates us, we share the same food, traditions and culture. Shirine: You mentioned being interested in poetry and Gazal. This poetic tradition in the Arab world is really ancient and has so many purposes, including political or spiritual ones. You're carrying this with you as one of those wandering poets throughout history, and also a resistance poet. Is that something you connect with as well from our history? Sabine: In my family, specifically, there have been a couple of resistance writers and poets on my paternal grandmother's side. She is related to Saed Aael, the one whom the Ottomans hanged. He was a journalist and a poet as well. My grandfather on my mother's side, whom I have never met, used to write poetry and Gazal. I always found it interesting to read what they've left behind. I find that we share a lot of things in common in the poetic way he wrote. In the sense of being a rebellious or revolutionary author, I think I owe it to myself and my community that attempt to create something that is revolutionary in a sense. Even though, like I said, I don't think that the music that I'm making is revolutionary. I think the work that I am doing on the streets with Palestinian organisations is more revolutionary and important. But, I think that I, being a woman, and being able to speak my mind, and offering this different way of thought, and rapping, and constructing sentences in different ways of rhyming - I am contributing something that is revolutionary in a sense. But I don't think it's something that people are going to appreciate now. I think years from now, people are going to realise what it is that I made. I kinda feel like I am one of those people who will be famous after they die. Shirine: You are famous in your own way. You've also been so prolific, it's incredible. Can you talk more about your latest release with SHLTF and what emotions fuelled this track? Sabine: This track is actually different from all of my other tracks, because it is not on the emotional side. It's the closest I have to the hip-hop culture and that sense of flexing. I like it because it is more on the fun, playful side of things, and it's also me saying that I don't have to constantly be creating super poetic and deep stuff, I can still have fun, make people dance and move. When I play it live, it is really fun and very interactive. The track is called 'Te3nid', which basically means 'stubbornness', and it's like a relation to the music scene, like how it is and what we were talking about. So, it's me saying, 'f*** you' - you can still be toxic and I'm gonna still do my s*** and make amazing things, and drop things that not of you can't imagine and people are still going to listen to it'. It's just me flexing that aspect and being relevant as opposed to in a non-relevant way. Shirine: It's so good. Is there something else or a message you want to share? Sabine: I collaborated recently with Liliane Chlela, who is absolutely brilliant, and it is something that I am so proud of. I really appreciate the few women that we have in the music scene in Lebanon who are really pushing the envelope and creating new sounds. I feel like this is also important for me to work on now, as well- this creation of the sounds that make up our community as Lebanese female artists.
CairoScene
17-03-2025
- Entertainment
- CairoScene
SceneNoise x Hiya Dialogues: Kamilya Jubran
Interview conducted by Shirine Saad Born in Al Rameh, a village in northern occupied Palestine in Galilee, Kamilya Jubran is a composer, singer and oud player who has become one of the leading figures in the experimental Arabic music scene. Growing up in a musically-inclined household, with her father working as a music teacher, Jubran was exposed to a rich repertoire of classical Arabic music like Umm Kulthum at a young age. She was so deeply immersed in these classics that making music ended up becoming a rather organic process for her. However, rather than following suit with the same school of her upbringing, Jubran created her own musical language and joined the iconic collective Sabreen, an avant-garde project from Jerusalem. She spent 20 years with them, exploring the intersection of Arabic folklore, jazz and contemporary music. Personal and political, traditional yet forward-thinking, Jubran's music boldly breaks away from the rigid confines of classical singing and composition methods, experimenting with new ways to use texts in music in fluid movements between tradition and modernity. She's constantly reinventing her sound, redefining musical boundaries, and crafting dialogues between past, present and future, opening doors for many musicians and singers to reconsider and expand their creativity. In this new episode of SceneNoise x Hiya dialogues, Lebanese journalist and DJ Shirine Saad speaks with Kamilya about her classical musical upbringing, Umm Kultum and how her time with the Sabreen collective and experimental musicians around the world helped her discover her own sound. SceneNoise x Hiya Dialogues is a series conducted by Shirine Saad, highlighting radical feminist voices and influential artists from the SWANA underground scene who are actively engaging with historical revolutionary movements to challenge the cis-heteropatriarchal and capitalist structures within the industry through their art, music and poetry. Looking at the situation now in Palestine, it's really horrifying. Do you feel powerless or are you feeling that in your work, for example, you're able to continue to resist? I was not born on the 7th of October, 2023. I was born a little bit before, a Palestinian born in Israel in 1963. Through my long years in Palestine and then the last of course 20 years in Europe, when I decided to move or change a physical address, I never saw any glimpse of a better situation. Of course, recently it's just getting worse. But, this doesn't mean that we or the situation was better before, it was maybe a time bomb. We might go back to how it was before. I don't really feel optimistic. But, the Palestinian resistance and the resistance of those who support Palestine give me much hope. How about your practice at the moment, do you feel creative? Are you writing, reading or listening to music - what helps you sort of get through these times? I go on doing more or less what I think I have to do, or what I think makes me feel alive. I wish every day to wake up and have a few little pieces in my brain that will help me think of how to continue making music. This is my only obsession at the moment, figuring things out. Because music is my life. It's not work for me. But, I really feel more and more challenged now, because in my music I never express myself according to certain political events. I focus my thinking on musical expression. I create music because I think there are so many things to do in the sphere where I choose myself to be, knowing that we can't do everything we wish to do. So, I decided to be just very focused on what I'm doing and the way I see music, the way I hear it, in the way I wish to hear it worldwide. And, whenever huge emotional and humanitarian events happen, of course, I'm paralysed like everybody else in the world. So yeah, I'm there right now. Through any kind of language, whether it is an artistic language or not, it's really hard to make sense of this total genocide we're witnessing It's very hard to accept it as real. What are your thoughts about that? I mean. There's life, where we're witnessing a lot of things, and then there's art, and the question is, 'Where is the line between both realities?' And, though they are not very disconnected, it's just a matter of the capacity of expression like, 'Am I able to', 'Do I wish to do that or do I need time to absorb things?', 'Am I involved at all or do I want to be involved or not?', 'Are we all responsible, and in what way and what shall we do?' These are really very diverse and big questions, and I think all of us are tormented by such questions. And, at the moment, everybody is reacting the way they see is appropriate to them, where they feel they're honest with themselves and where they see it's important to do, and they are capable of doing it. I wanted to ask you about your feminist and queer influences because I know you grew up in a musical Palestinian family, and I was wondering how your feminist awareness took shape growing up? Actually, it's funny you asked me about this question because, for me, it's as if it was there all the time since I was, maybe, five or six years old. But, at the time, of course, we didn't have this language, or this kind of awareness and those expressions. But, it didn't matter to me. I was brought up in a patriarchal society under occupation, of course, this occupation and the system of colonisation were at the time very European, and are still in the Middle East right now, whether you want it or not. What I really wanted at the time as a kid, and then as a young lady and an adult, was mainly making the music that I wanted to create or leading the life I wanted. I was just looking forward to being 18 years old to get out of my parents' house and live a life that any human being at the age of 18 deserves to have. No matter where the society is. I didn't think about that in the context of feminism or in terms of revolutions, I was just living what I believed in and that's about it. I mean without big slogans, without big movements. I understand that we have to make movements, we have to make revindications and we have to call the things in their names, but maybe in my generation that wasn't yet an issue in the place where I came from. Whereas if you look at the United States, maybe at the time they were much further in their struggle towards women's rights, feminism, and so on. I never felt like I belonged there though and I never felt I was doing something different. For you to pick up the Oud and the Qanun and to sing as a woman at the beginning; was it something that was easy? Was it supported by the people around you? And, did you feel really free on this path? Well, I don't want to sound like I was a spoiled kid. But, it was just a very natural thing to happen in our household. It just so happened that my father was fond of music, and my mother was too. My father was really a self-made man who decided to make music, and build instruments. So, I was born to a young couple who really struggled for their existence and had forbidden hobbies at the time - because at the time, they were forbidden hobbies. You're living in occupied Palestine in 1948, you don't have to think about art, you have to just think about being safe and not get killed or uprooted. They were lucky in that sense. I grew up in this house where music was practiced every day, before meals, after meals, and if we didn't have it every day, then there was something wrong. It was not a privilege, it was just something very natural that I grew up surrounded by instruments, and when I played them, it was the most organic thing to happen. There was never a discussion at home. How about when you wanted to go out and perform in public - to begin to travel, as well? Did you feel supported? Was it something that you were able to do freely? I did, actually. I can't remember what kind of state of mind I had at the time when I was 18. I just saw that the sky was my limit and my parents never said anything about that. Of course, they may have wished for me to sing or become the person who just will sing this rich repertoire of Egyptian masterpieces. At the time, Umm Kulthum was the goddess at our home, and no other music was really appreciated at home besides hers. Also, the big masters of composition were basically of Egyptian origins, like Abdul Wahab and his counterparts. So, of course, my parents wished for me to become the person who would follow this line. And while I really loved that repertoire, at a certain point in time, when I was 14 or 15, I started to ask myself, okay, there are other things in the world that might interest me, not only that. So, when I joined the Sabreen group in 1982 in Jerusalem and started to follow this way of thinking with the group, and this approach to creating and researching, the music was really strange for my parents. There was a big hiccup, like what are you doing? But, for me, it was just the right thing to do. And even at that moment, they were patient. Then they started to follow part of our concerts in Palestine at the time. They became fans, and I really appreciated that. My parents were simple people who didn't go to universities and they don't follow any kind of intellectual streams of thinking. It was just natural. It was not only them. Certain conditions allowed people to look at things in a calm way. However, of course, the escalations changed afterwards. A lot of different political and economic pressures attacked Palestinian society, not only in Palestine but elsewhere as well. People became more and more stressed, so we started to be more cautious, afraid, worried and suspicious. I'm lucky to have lived this childhood, though it was really a childhood of war all the time. But, I don't know what happened, or what really became more harsh since 1963 when I was born. Things changed and I think unfortunately everything changed around me. I don't want to sound nostalgic, it still exists, but we have to just look around and see and analyse the positive things that are still happening. We have to stick to that and have faith in it, otherwise, what else? When you said you were making music with the Sabreen group, trying to find a new sound. You kept saying, it felt right. What about that sound that made it feel like the right thing for you to be doing? It relied on the ambitions of certain individuals, who once woke up and said 'Who are we?', 'What are we doing and what for?', and this is how any change or movement happens. Questioning is very important as it is the key to any changing movement, be it music, culture or whatever. But, it's also a vicious cycle, because it's enough for a person to have a model somewhere, whether something that they see in front of them or in history. And, at a certain point in our lives, we feel that we want to realise something and feel better. For me, I was brought up with classical Levantine and Egyptian music, and it was my daily food. So, at a certain time, I got fed up and then I said okay, I want something else. At the time, during the 70s in the North of occupied Palestine, we started to hear songs of resistance which were interpreted by great musicians like Ziad Rahbani. And, locally, in Palestine, there were little timid temptations of groups of artists, which made me realise that there are alternatives to the classical repertoire. It made me think more and more about what I really wanted to sing at the time. With those questions, I moved to Jerusalem and I went to Hebrew University. I heard about Sabreen, and they were doing what I was already asking about at the time. They were just doing something that I personally wanted to do, but I never found the words to express it. It meant making the music that we thought should be done, and it was clear to me that this was the music school where I wanted to belong. At the time, I was studying something completely different in the university because studying music at the time for Palestinians was a big no, you didn't have much of a choice regarding your studies. There were no conservatoires to teach Arabic music, and Israel didn't allow us as Palestinians to do what we deserved to do. So, the need was so urgent for me to look for the right sound and melody that made me feel okay and good in my skin. Also, being brought up in classical repertoire made me very selective about the quality of music I'm making, aesthetically. I didn't want to make any cheap music or pop music for entertainment. Maybe it was a little bit odd, but I was looking for something to correspond with those values I was brought up on. But, at the same time, I was open to suggestions. I was open to the wave of protest songs and 'El Oghnya l Moltazma', a song that carried a certain level of engagement socially and politically, not only towards us as Palestinians but all of us Arabs because we're all subjugated to the same misery but with different levels of tyranny and occupation. But, musically I was really obsessed with the question of 'What is that really I wanted to sing?' At the age of 14 or 15, I sang the music that came into Palestine, produced and written by Arab artists who lived in Lebanon or in exile. And, for us Palestinians, this music was like a revolution – it was for us purely alternative music, the only music that everyone should sing. With those practices in me, I can say why I was attracted to music such as Sabreen's, the words, the different melodies and the different interpretations. I remember when we heard the music of Marcel Khalife, a singer who sings with the oud different melodies with modern texts that have really different political and humanitarian dimensions, especially the poems of Mahmoud Darwish. For me, that was a revelation. It was really cool. And, also hearing Ziad Rahbani sing about the Lebanese Civil War in a kind of sarcastic way showed me that there is a possibility that there are really things to do still and a lot of things that have not yet been done. My meeting with Sabreen meant the same thing in Palestine. That chunk of time in my life made a lot of me and it still does, it opened up so many horizons for us in times when nobody showed us new horizons we had to make, build and breakthrough. I'm still to this day discovering new horizons, and Sabreen did that for, and still doing for younger generations living in Palestine who didn't know who it was and discovering it now. You mentioned that your parents felt that the music you were making with the group was a little strange, but then your music became even stranger –as you began to push the sounds and the lyrics even more. So, can you tell me about this creative process you had from the beginning until you've become more abstract with your own music? When I joined Sabreen, I think I was the youngest in the group and I happened to be the only woman in a group of men. The leader of the group was more alert about the political situation in Palestine, and at the time I was so young and wasn't educated enough politically. Being born in such a place doesn't mean necessarily that you are aware of all the facts because there is continuous systematic oppression by the occupation power that tries to just erase the memories of the oppressed and brainwash them from being able to fight. So, working with the group helped me maintain all of the values from my musical upbringing at home, and also exposed me to a lot of music genres that I didn't have at home or never heard of before. And, I was able to make a combination of both things. Where I'm writing now is trying to find an answer to what values I really stick to and where I want to bring them today, to go further and develop. Why did you want to make music that kept going stranger and stranger from the pop and shaabi songs that a lot of musicians now keep going back to? It's not a matter of being strange, I think it's a matter of sounding a little bit too much different or unfamiliar. Culture is about real access to things and the manipulation of this access towards things makes us feel deprived of things. There have been so many fixated values forced on music that naturally it didn't have. We categorized it and gave it a cultural and economic status and ruined it. We're all living in that illusion that we have the right to listen to whatever but I mean for real we all don't have the right to listen to whoever because music is manipulated and forced by so many powers. And, this is a really tough reality. I was searching for a purer expression for my voice and I found a lot of that working with the Sabreen group. I believed in the vision the group carried at the time and it was great for me on a personal level. It felt so liberating in all aspects at the time, and with all those good feelings I had, I was greedy for more. And, then I moved to Europe and kept my research going on. You said to Sabreen, that you discovered a liberation of feelings and sound. Did you get more liberation after your move and becoming a solo artist? Yes, I felt more free doing things because only I would have to pay the price for the mistakes or whatever. I mean, the responsibility took another shape, it was really personal whatever I wanted to say, discover or experiment with. But, it also was like a double-edged sword. I started to compose myself for the first time when I was 39, I had just come to France with nothing and had to build myself from zero. It was quite the hassle that I had to handle but it was fine as long as things were working out for me musically. That really supported my legal situation in the country. I never felt that I had to do something else. I feel very fortunate and privileged in terms of being able to say what I want to say anytime. You mentioned earlier the word experimentation, what that it mean to you, in terms of how you write, listen or collaborate with other artists? For me, experimentation means, first of all, wanting more, and that need for more comes from being critical; to criticize the things that I have and that makes me want to try different things. It starts from there, and then the harder question comes, 'What do I want or where do I go?', and then comes the question of aesthetics. If I have a clear basic instinct of where my aesthetics allow me to go and in which corner to search, this is really crucial in finding the right threads that connect you to that world you are drawn to; to meet people who search for themselves and ask themselves questions about their own cultures. I was lucky enough to meet such musicians in Switzerland and it helped me to feel that I am not alone and find a zone in which I want to learn, especially in contemporary music, electronic and jazz music. I found those certain areas very interesting and I managed to ask myself questions about my roots and where I could bring those roots to develop. It's just as if you meet the right person, you find the area where you feel you are good. What does the word 'dissonance' mean to you and what does it feel like? Dissonance is the opposite of 'harmony' right? I think it is such a powerful essential part of music and we need it in everything. Why? Because otherwise, it's boring. It's flat. I think human beings are always in need of dissonance, otherwise, we just go home and die. Don't you think dissonance is a representational reflection of our reality? When we have bombs, machinery and all that sorts of noise ruling our lives, especially in Palestine, while the music that's being made is so melodic. It doesn't really reflect the truth, no? You know the empty cup and the full cup. It's a necessary part; the thing and its opposite. We need contradiction or life will be insufferable. How are you able to function and be creative with the horrible things that are happening at the moment and the horrifying genocide we are witnessing? Are you able to be creative in the same way? And, does that change the way you look at your music and writing? Yes and no. I mean no in the sense of the difference that we are living in today in comparison to previous times is the intensity and brutality that it's happening in a very short period of time. But, the content itself is still the same as it's been many years ago. It's not something new for me, nor it's quite today's because everything has been talking about it since October 7th. So, in that sense, the pathway that I choose to be in –for many years now making music -has always been influenced by the background where I come from. A background of a little bit of history and a lot of a present and not much clear future. I think that played a role in shaping the way I look at music, and the music I wish to do. So in that sense, things have not changed, I am just following the same line. Now, the intensity of the event right now could make me go down into a dark hole, so I have to pull myself up again. This could provoke certain words or sentences that I write in whatever creations I'm working on right now. I want to shout and I want to breathe and that takes another shape in the music I'm making. How so? And, also when you said a little bit of history, a lot of present and not much future, how does that sound musically for you? Musically, I try to hold to my connections to the past, it's not too far backwards because the references we have to that past we call 'classical' in the Middle East region, are not too old. I'm talking about the middle of the 19th century, this is not too much backwards. It's not the Middle Ages. And, the present is what I try to modulate today and link to that past to express that cross-cultural life that I have been managing, and try to find a language that puts all of these elements together. And, there is not much of a future because our world is too saturated by so many sounds and sometimes I feel it's nonsense what I'm doing. We did everything and there are too many things happening and now we're facing the artificial intelligence that will keep going over and moving faster and faster and probably erase whatever we know. How do you compose? Do you hear sounds or words and how do you react to how you are feeling in your music? This is very complicated to answer because of all of those emotions that accompany me when I see something in the paper or a recording, I don't dictate them. They happen automatically and then the expression comes. When I compose, either there's an idea that I'm working on or I am collaborating with someone on that particular idea and then musically speaking, I try to find a solution or a suggestion for that idea. So, we talk about combinations, melodies, rhythms, and sounds. I think the fact that I'm more and more going towards improvised music in the European sense of the word, particularly around the end of 2022, is linked to the urge for immediate expression–putting the emotions first-hand and letting them go out before sitting and writing and thinking and trying to find complexity on a paper. At that point, emotions are guiding me, but still, I don't know them until the expressions come out musically. What do you mean by improvisation in the European sense? Because, of course, in Arab music, there was improvisation in classical music with moments of solos and so on. Certainly, there are. What I meant is that improvised music became a genre in the Western world in comparison to written music. Those concepts don't exactly apply to Middle Eastern music –yes, there's an element of improvising that exists in our music but it doesn't mean that we call this music improvised. There are rules that were set in order to talk about improvised music; we don't call jazz music improvised even though that improvisation element is an essential part of that genre of music. You're the expert of Umm Kulthum –but she used to go on very long sort of flights in the middle of her shows that were so beautiful and drove the audience to a stance of trance or ecstasy even. How do you call these moments, where she was not even singing any words, she was just kind of improvising with her voice. Improvisation. It's simply improvisation. Like when any instrumentalist would play freely and we call it 'Taqasem' in Arabic. It's the same when a singer improvises vocally, we call it 'Taqasem Al Sawt', meaning the improvisation done by the vocals. Why do you think she was able to bring audiences to this trance-like state with her vocal improvisation? Because, traditionally speaking, belonging to this culture of the Middle East, we know the importance of virtuosity in music, especially in traditional or classical music. That virtuosity is important and it's a kind of an element that enables a level of excellence of the material you're dealing with. So, the more you know, the more experienced you are, and the more free or able you'll become in the improvisation when the right moment comes. And, I think Umm Kulthum was raised up to that culture and she was brought up with that way of thinking, and that made her such a master. Do you think she was freer than most singers at the time and still is one of the freest in terms of interpretations, even in her life, she was able to embody such creativity and liberation. Musically speaking, she had the mastery and she had the capacity vocally, and that makes her unique. And, these two elements didn't exist in the musical careers of other singers at her time. And, her being surrounded by a group of composers and musicians who shared her background allowed such phenomena to happen. Most of the songs during that era, whether the short 3-4 minute songs or the monologues-like ones, from Zakria Ahmed to Um Kultum, were composed in a certain structure, which is basically an idea of improvised melody –but it's very stable more or less structured. To interoperate that type of music is a wholly difficult exercise to do. It's because the composers themselves at that time were virtuosos and excellent improvisers that their compositions followed that sense. And, Umm Kulthum had the capacity to execute such a thing. I understand that Umm Kulthum doesn't have to be liked by everybody –but we have to listen to music that we don't like, analyse them thoroughly and learn from them. So returning to dissonance, because it's not only the dissonance in the interpretation or the moments of free improvisation but also in the manner of performance, of living and the values you're embodying as a woman –are you catering to patriarchal society and stepping in that seductive submissive role or are you in a dominate role? First, the domination in a very patriarchal domain is the mastery of singing a style of singing that was basically initiated by men –so Umm Kulthum was better than them. She had the capacity to interpret that music which became a huge reference in the Arab singing style and vocalism. Nobody can ignore that phenomenon of Umm Kulthum because she was immediately qualified and with no discussion about whether we liked her strong position or the domination of her orchestra. People usually associate a certain appearance –with all the hair and the makeup -with you being a woman Arab singer. But, you've cleared yourself from all of this. What does that mean for you and how do you do it? When I want to talk about what I do, my reference in the aesthetics of music will go back to Umm Kulthum's school, which is not her directly, but the people who came before her. And, that's where I dig. Though they were men, it doesn't mean I want to burn them because they were men –they created something amazing. Now, the way I look at that invention and the way I want to use it, I give myself all the freedom to do what I want to do. You said that you are interested in the excess–what happens outside or between the rules or the notes, which creates moments of magic. Can elaborate more on these moments of flight of imagination? It's a matter of preoccupation probably. Umm Kulthum was preoccupied with what she was doing and that's it. I think I'm preoccupied with other things these days, I don't share in that sense of preoccupation of that period of time. And, that's normal. We advance in time so we get interested in other questions that tackle the evolution of a certain tradition. And, I think I'm there at the moment, preoccupied by that notion or thought. What do we do with the education we receive and how we project to the future, is what I'm concerned about. And, I expressed it in my melodies in the latest creations I'm doing. You've always been a revolutionary singer, whether under the occupation with your band or now on our own, are you taking that tradition of revolutionary music and exploring new ways of doing it? I mean, when I started going in that direction, it wasn't about me being interested in revolutionary music, it was about whatever I was feeling and what I liked to do at the time. But, do you see your music as a weapon of resistance? I wouldn't use the word 'weapon'. What I do is just probably a way of defending thoughts or a way of thinking or looking at things, So tell me more about this way of thinking, especially in the context of living under the occupation all the time. No matter what we do, living under the occupation, it doesn't have to be revolutionary music, even if we are just baking our bread, no matter what we do –this is resistance in a sense. And, not only in Palestine but in any occupied society as well, the people who suffer from the regime of hegemony, resist every single morning. So, that's one thing. Creating music, of course, is not detached from that reality. It gives it a colour or energy and I'm very much aware of that. But, then at the end, it's a personal journey of musical discovery. And how do you express that personal journey? For you, it's about moments of departure from the expectations of what you are supposed to do as a traditional Palestinian musician. When I joined the Sabreen group, the music we created was so far away from being folklore or resistance songs that would talk directly about the Palestinian cause or the occupation. Instead, we focused on the music we wanted to create and that made sense for us at the time to do it. And, that some form of a new language –took some time for our audience to adapt to it. The material we created at that time was revolutionary in that sense. When I'm thinking about that surge of pop music that's coming out of the region, it doesn't make me feel good –so, how do we approach that question of the new language, and who gets to decide what the normal language is and what is the new language is and how we respond? I think it's a master of accumulation of productions and classification. And, it's a matter of being exposed or not being familiar with or not. It's how we educate our ears mostly. And, don't you think we can practice a capacity for really listening and liberating? Sensorial liberation, right? I think we're able to learn all the time. It's just a matter of wanting. But, the more we advance in time, the more it gets difficult to defend our creativity between brackets because we are so swamped with a lot of information all the time. So, we can easily lose the compass and our focus and in order to be able to maintain the lines, it's a big battle that requires a lot of work. However, there is an advantage to that age as well, which we can find any information we can easily. So, it's a double-edged sword. We advance, the price is very high and things need more effort but the world is much more open. You sing in Arabic. How do you feel about people not understanding the words and the language of your music? That question didn't only exist since I moved to Europe, but also when I toured with Sabreen to non-arab countries. So, at the time during the performances, I had to explain a little bit more about what the songs were talking about. Now, after I moved to Europe, the question became more insistent, and I had to find solutions –however, I'm still working on that - to communicate the content of what I'm saying. I tried subtitles, distributing papers and translations in QR codes, and sometimes both. But, there are so many ways to overcome that hurdle of communication. So far though, it works very well for me, sometimes even some of the audience would come to me and tell me that they don't need to understand what I'm saying they can feel it. You do whatever you have to do because it's a part of your job to communicate the message to the audience. Are you ever scared of speaking your mind, making music and talking about Palestine? No. I'm worried about the general situation of course, and the people who pay the price and I feel helpless. I'm privileged that I make music about it, and I feel ashamed. There's nothing to compare. But, don't you think that making music has so much power? I mean consciously I know that. And, all of us in that industry, know that it's important to go on and do what everybody is doing. But, this goes in parallel with the daily pain and the sense of helplessness that you feel. I also feel that going on doing what we believe we need to do is the answer. Watch the full interview below:
