Ana Hayou

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13ZkMFyV7FY

A more traditional version can be found on Spotify (search for ‘ana hayou ouled bambara’ in Spotify and you will find it - the performer is Mohammed Chaouqi); I didn’t find that version on YouTube, however, but it might be there. In this traditional version, there is voice, qraqebs (Gnawa hand cymbals), and gimbri (Gnawa bass) only. This version should give the percussion some ideas for the basic 12/8 beat (and its ambiguous 4 feel and 6 feel) and how it is played, and it should also give bass some ideas for interesting patterns to incorporate.

I chose the Aziz Sahmaoui version for us for two reasons. The first reason is that it incorporates several melodic instruments (guitar, keyboards, bass, as well as the lead instrument which is like a gimbri but higher pitched) and qraqeb as well as drum set, and thus should give us some ideas for melodic/harmonic solos to incorporate. The second reason is that the different cross rhythms provided by voice and by several of the melodic rhythms are very cool indeed; if we could pull those off, it would sound most excellent.

The following link is a brief discussion and demonstration of how to play the Gnawa 12/8 on drum set, by two great North African percussionists, Karim Ziad and Omar el Barkaoui: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=00qZfrqHuzI.

Lyrics for the song and an English translation of most of those lyrics have been graciously provided by a friend of Kais’s, as follows:

Ana hayou berkati berkat sudan (response) {I'm traditional (or old school) I sit like people sit in Sudan}
Gnawi wahayou berkati berkat sudan {I am Gnawi (or I belong to gnawa) and sit like people sit in Sudan}
Ujiwa hayou berkati berkat sudan*
Tiwaji moho berkati berkat sudan
Jhouji hayou berkati berkat sudan
Tiwaji moho berkati berkat sudan
Ati ati a foulan (response) {Come here foulan (Just like in Arabic, foulan here means 'someone', in general. I am actually not sure if it's Fusha, Maybe just a dialect )}
Ati ati a dakar {Come here Dakar (I think it's just a tribute to Dakar, Senegal)}
Ati ati a khoya {Come here brother (just like in Arabic)}
Ati ati a lella {Come here lady(As I am sure you know Lella is a prefix for lady in Northern Africa)}
Afouss afouss a foulan {Clap your hands foulan }
Afouss afouss a sidi {Clap your hands Sir}
Ati ati ya lella {Clap your hands Lady}

• we don't have the translation of Ujiwa, tiwaji and jhouji, but it looks like the object of the sentence, since the 'sit like people in Sudan' part is still there, so could be pronouns...