The music of Marcel Khalife

Religion and freedom of expression. Marcel Khalife & Mahmoud Darwish, "Ana Yusuf ya Abi". (music, documentary film; Middle East, Islam)

Note: some of the following links are broken as Marcel seems to have reorganized his site...

Music, art, religion and politics: Marcel Khalife and Mahmoud Darwish

Marcel Khalife in Freemuse, a website dedicated to freedom of musical expression.

Watch Marcel Khalife in performance (the video begins by showing the double bass; Marcel appears later, on the Arabic lute called oItalic textud)

Ana Yusuf ya Abi: the controversy

Read the Qur'anic passage in question (and listen to its recitation by clicking on the verse)

Read this chronological newspaper archive:

Some thought questions:

How does this controversy relate to Lebanese identity politics?
What is the difference between Qur'anic recitation and Khalife's performance?
How is the controversy related to post-colonial issues of identity in Lebanon?
Why might Sunni authorities been more critical of Khalife than Shia?
Why is secularism such a contested issue in the post-colonial world? How does it follow from the colonial era, both top-down and bottom-up?
Why do you suppose the song created so much more controversy than the poem?

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