Popular Islamic music: local and global

New genres of popular Islamic performance: within the Muslim world, and beyond it...

Tuesday (12a)

World Music, Folklorization, and Festivalization in the Muslim World

Due

• Read: Kapchan, Deborah A. 2008. “The Promise of Sonic Translation: Performing the Festive Sacred in Morocco.” American Anthropologist 110 (4): 467–83.
• Watch: Sound of the Soul

Submit a brief review on these works, noting their connections, as two perspectives on this famous festival.

Also sample a bit of each of the following videos - songs and concerts by famous regional and international nasheed stars:

• Sharifah Khasif Fadzillah (Malaysia)
• Mahmud al-Tuhami (Egypt)
• Sami Yusef[1] (British, of Azerbaijani origin)
• Zain Bikha (South African)
• Mishary Rashid Alafasy (Kuwaiti)
• Dawud Wharnsby (Canadian)

Class

• What is popular music? Key features (none necessary or sufficient, but often present in clusters):
  • Widespread, not narrowly limited (by social class, ethno-linguistic or religious group, age group)
  • Mediated or staged
  • Commodified
  • Professional
  • Non-participatory - at least in sound
  • Centrality of "music"
  • Entertainment/aesthetic function is present
  • Importance of beauty, attractiveness
  • Linked to music industry, which also shapes or even creates it
  • Other attributes?
• Turino's four fields of music practice:
  • Participatory
  • Presentational
  • High fidelity recording
  • Studio audio art
• An experimental typology of popular Islamic music
  • Traditional ritual/ceremonial genres, performed by specialists and others in traditional contexts
  • Popular versions of those genres, performed by genre specialists, influenced by the wider field of popular music; new contexts
  • Similar genres, embedded in the wider field of popular music, performed by broader class of singers and musicians
  • Folkloric and festival presentations: staged versions, communicating across cultural/religious boundaries, held to represent the "authentic" ("quotation marks"), focus on the "culture". Touristic, nationalistic, mainly live performance.
  • World music presentations: more focus on the music and artist(s). Commercial product (live or recorded)
  • Fusions: new forms
• Some examples - how to analyze? classify?
  • Shaykh Abdel Basit. Popular music, really? Maybe!
  • Shakyh Naqshabandi, traditional ibtihalat
  • Shaykh Naqshabandi in popular music arrangement
  • Four traditional hadras and one more popular one? Shaykh Yasin
  • Mahmud al-Tuhami, Shaykh Yasin's son
  • Qawwali at Nizam al-Din Awliya in Delhi
  • Sabri brothers in concert
  • Qawwali in Bollywood feature
  • Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan in Last Temptation of Christ
  • Mevlevi ayin or sema (genuine ritual? Hard to find!)
  • Mevlevi in Istanbul Tekke for tourists[2]
  • Mevlevi ceremony as UNESCO intangible treasure
  • Mevlevi music in concert (al-Kindi ensemble)
  • Mevlevi music and techno, with Kudsi Erguner [3]
  • Sharifah Khasif Fadzillah (Malaysia), winner of International Qur'an competition [4]
  • Local popular Muslim genres, from Egypt and the Gulf to West Africa to Indonesia
  • Gnawa-funk-jazz fusion with Marcus Miller and Moustapha Baqbou at Gnawa festival
  • Global Muslim popular music: Nashid
    • Sami Yusef[5] (British, of Azerbaijani origin)
    • Zain Bikha (South African)
    • Mishary Rashid Alafasy (Kuwaiti)
    • Dawud Wharnsby (Canadian)
• Fez Festival

Thursday (12b)

Beyond Nasheed: Popular Islamic Music in the West

Due

• Watch Taqwacore: The Birth of Punk Islam
• Read Islam in the Mix: Lessons of the Five Percent, by anthropologist Ted Swedenburg (University of Arkansas) [Note: unfortunately many of his links are broken, but you can google to get the same or similar information]. Locate two examples of Islamic hip hop online. Explain how each conveys an Islamic orientation, based on lyrics or images or other features, and how they contrast. (You may locate examples from Swedenburg's article if you wish, or may broaden the search to hip hop worldwide.) 1 page total.

Some links related to Swedenburg's article you may like to sample as you read:

• Allah U Akbar, Brand Nubian. [6] 1992.
• It was written: The Message, Nas [7] 1996.
• Fu-Gee-La, The Fugees [8] 1996.
• gods earths and 85ers, Poor Righteous Teachers [9] 1996.
• In The Ghetto, Eric B. & Rakim [10] 1990.
• Party for Your Right to Fight, Public Enemy [11] 1988.
• Ain't No Mystery, Brand Nubian (with lyrics) [12] 1993.
• True Fresh MC, The Genius [13] 1990.
• On and on, Erykah Badu [14] 1997.
• Dog It, Digable Planets [15] 1994.

A broader sampling of Islamic hip hop (including Nation of Islam, NGE, and Sunni - along with nashid and Islamic pop generally) can be located here: Muslim Hip Hop

Ironically for some, Islam has opened a space for women especially those dissatisfied with the objectifications of mainstream hip hop culture, and sometimes deeply politically engaged. See especially:

• Sista Keilana
• Boshia

Beyond music there is also a range of spoken word "language performance", such as "Dead Man Walking" by Amir Suleiman (whom I saw perform live at the UofA in the early 2000s, invited by the Muslim Student Association)

Class

• Trajectories in African American Islam
• Musical messaging in multiple genres