As elsewhere in the Middle East, folk music is a normal part of life in Syria, providing a soundtrack to family events now, as it has for centuries. Syria shares with its neighbor Lebanon the dabke, the dance of rhythmic stamping steps and much popular Syrian music has a rural folk influence. Modern singers such as Ali al-Deek return again and again to traditional themes, with nostalgic songs about village life, as does the great Sabah Fakhri who has been a major voice in Syria for over three decades. The undisputed master of muwashshahat and qudood styles, Fakhri was the head of the Union of Syrian Artists, and something of a one-man Syrian folklore industry with hundreds of recordings to his name. He is a singer of considerable stamina and wound up in the Guinness Book of Records for a performance in Caracas, where he sang for an eye-bulging 10 hours without a pause. In the younger generation Huwayda, who comes from the coastal city of Latakia, has recorded romantic lyrics to traditional folk melodies.
With its capital, Damascus, claiming the position of being the oldest continuously inhabited capital of the world, it is no surprise that urban traditions play an important part in Syrian cultural life. The key traditional style of music is urban, classical and highly sophisticated. The muwashsha (plural muwashshahat) is a classical song form of call and response which originated in Andalusia under the caliphate. As is common in the Arabic-speaking world, poetry is central to the muwashsha form and this form of music is generally considered to be presented in its purest and most elevated from in Aleppo in the north of Syria. The muwashshahat are not of themselves devotional but play a central part in the zikr, Sufi rituals. The best-known exponents of this style are the Al-Kindi Ensemble, based in Aleppo. Named after a ninth century mathematician and philosopher and led by the French Muslim convert Julien Jallaladin Weiss, the emsemble perform internationally, presenting their wasla (suites of songs and improvisations) with whirling dervish Sufi dancers.
Although the Egyptians may claim him as their own, one name stands head and shoulders over modern Syrian popular music, and is in fact one of the handful of pan-Arab superstars. More than thirty years after his death, Farid al Atrache is still the single most-played Syrian artist on Syrian radio and television. Born in a border town south of Damascus, his parents were Princess Alia and Prince Fahd al-Atrash from the religious minority Druze clan. They were engaged in a struggle against the French after World War I, so, in the mid 1920s Fahd sent his wife, young Farid and his sister Amal to Cairo for their own safety. There the children's mother played the oud professionally and Farid took up the instrument, eventually becoming renowned for his oud taqasim or improvisations. With his sister Amal, who took the stage name Asmahan and became a major star in her own right, Farid soon found his way into the Cairo movie scene. Asmahan's death in 1944 was no hindrance to Farid's screen career and he developed into the first singing superstar of Arab cinema, often paired with oriental dancer Samia Gamal, and singing his (self-composed) songs such as "Noura Noura", "Leyla" "Hallet Layali," and "Gameel Gamal," instant hits that are still popular today.
Two popular present-day singers from Syria have made the leap to pan-Arab stardom: Asala Nasri and George Wassouf. Asala Nasri - sometimes known simply by her first name - is close to becoming a diva in the grand style but is also a straight-ahead pop star. Recent recordings have been in the gulf accent and have included settings of poems by various gulf royals. George Wassouf, meanwhile, manages to combine a badboy image with a voice reminiscent of the greatest tarab singers, earning him the soubriquet “sultan tarab,� the King of Tarab. His rapid transformation from the wunderkind from Kafroun in Homs to international playboy has been fueled by his ability to attract controversy and 1001 tales of both ill health and fast living. Nevertheless he has found time to release some thirty albums and his gravelly voice remains one of the most distinctive and highly regarded in Arabic music.
As a modern pop market, Syria is relatively undeveloped. The format of choice is still the cassette, and that is more often than not pirated. Although copyright laws have recently been instituted, economic realities suggest that old habits die hard. Despite that, one group, Kulna Sawa - a folk rock outfit from Damascus, have bucked a trend of pirate CDs to gain a couple of international CD releases. Adding western folk harmonies to traditional Syrian melodies, they have recently toured the US.
Elsewhere, on the European "world music" scene there are a number of expatriate Syrian performers. Qanun virtuoso Abdullah Chhadeh tours with his group Nara, interpreting melodies based on traditional Syrian themes with a western, jazz-style ensemble. Having accompanied artists from Natacha Atlas to Kazem al Saher, his own recent CD release is based on the history and character of the ancient gates of Damascus. The group, Hewar, meanwhile, is an oriental jazz ensemble fronted by vocalist Dima Orsho who combine elements of western classical music with Arabic music and jazz. The newest star to hail from Syria was actually born in Kuwait to a Syrian family. Samo Zein is very much the 21st century pop package, with the requisite website, logo and a nice line in syrupy pop ballads. Trained as a sound engineer he is making it in the pan-Arab pop video world, and in a distant echo of the career of Farid al Atrache, Zaen's first Egyptian movie has just been released. — Tom Jackson
