Middle Eastern music, in all its diversity, makes inroads in Europe

With a line-up featuring eight artists from the Middle East, the recent Le Printemps de Bourges festival in France highlighted some of the talent from a musical scene that is fast-moving.

The Lebanese alternative rock band Mashrou’ Leila perform at Le Printemps de Bourges. AFP
Powered by automated translation

From Palestinian hip-hop and Egyptian electro to Lebanese blues-rock, artists from the Middle East are making inroads into the European music scene, as witnessed at the latest Le Printemps de Bourges festival in France at the end of last month.

This year’s edition in central France featured artists from the Middle East such as the hard-edged Palestinian rappers DAM.

The artists selected for the festival’s 39th edition showcased the “dazzling and extremely creative scene” in contemporary Middle East, says Elodie Mermoz, who was involved in the selections.

The six-day festival also featured stars from the wider music world, including the Australian folk-rock duo Angus and Julia Stone, singer Christine and The Queens, and the French-Finnish indie band The Dø.

But with a line-up featuring eight artists from the Middle East, the festival highlighted some of the talent from a musical scene that is fast-moving.

Mermoz says the growing interest in Middle Eastern artists goes hand-in-hand with the Arab Spring. The region-wide revolt “has woken up the youth” and “from the moment they left the streets, they needed another ground for expression and that was music,” she says.

Islam Chipsky, an energetic keyboard player from Egypt, who brings an electro dimension to percussion-heavy songs, received an ecstatic response when he performed. Chipsky, whose trio has also played under the name EEK, previously had a career performing at weddings in Cairo before his debut in Britain last year.

He plays down the significance of the Arab Spring on his own music – part of the growing electro shaabi genre that combines traditional Arab forms with western instruments.

“We were always there in the underground scene before the Arab Spring, but maybe for [the festival] you started to look at young people in these countries because of the Arab Spring,” he says. “Of course we get different exposure right now – not only us, but all the art scene in these countries – but that is not exactly that much related to the Arab Spring.”

Chipsky says that the electro shaabi genre was initially written off as “ghetto music” for the poor, but its appeal has rapidly spread.

“Right now, you can’t just ignore the fact that everyone knows about this music in Egypt – if not in the area, in the Middle East,” he says.

Such a marriage between traditional and modern forms is increasingly widespread in the Middle East.

Among other artists who enjoyed rave reviews in Bourges was the Lebanese band Mashrou’ Leila, who fuse rock with more traditional Arab vocals and violin. The group have already won a loyal following in the Middle East despite lyrics that touch on sometimes sensitive topics, and they will be touring Europe in the coming months.

But some artists from the Middle East are unconcerned about whether their music represents traditional elements.

Sary Moussa, a Lebanese experimental electronic musician, who goes by the stage name RadioKVM says: “Like plenty of Lebanese, I’m a mix of all the cultures around me, including on television.

“I come up with a synthesis of all of this culture and I don’t necessarily feel a need to be recognisably Arab.”

The same holds true for another Lebanese act, The Wanton Bishops, whose blues songs in English come across as being more from the banks of the Mississippi than the Mediterranean. The band are planning an extensive tour of France in July.

Hip-hop has been a force for social commentary since its birth and the Palestinian rappers DAM built a big following a decade ago with Meen Irhab (Who's the Terrorist?).

The band have increasingly found an audience outside the region, and in recent years have toured in Europe, North America and Japan.