Osama Kamal falls under the spell of a musician who has been biding his time I stepped into the Hekma Hall of the Al-Sawy Culture Wheel on 8 April and immediately felt that something unusual was going on. Everyone was waiting impatiently for their idol and friend, Maamoun El-Meligui, to step under the spotlight. El-Meligui is already a cult singer, his fans basking in the adoration of a genius of Egyptian song. Then he walks onto the stage, and his fans greet him with a roar of applause. Born in 1960, El-Meligui is making a comeback after a long absence from the music world. He reappeared back in 2005 with the famous song Al-Shawarea (The Streets), a song that many identify with the paintings of Salah Anani, as both the singer and the painter seem to share the same taste in folk art. El-Meligui's voice is straightforward and accessible. You may say that he sings as if drawing on the collective voice of the audience, but he tells me that he hesitated for a long time before making his comeback so late in life. A career architect, El-Meligui started playing the guitar at the age of 11. He was writing songs by 18, but it took years for his music to reach the public. As a young songwriter, he offered his songs to major singers with little luck. So, following the advice of his family, he became a full- time architect. He lived in Alexandria, started a family, and became a loving husband and father. Music was a hobby, something he practised in weekends, something he used to entertain family and friends. El-Meligui writes lyrics, composes and sings. For nearly 20 years, he had a famous television programme in Lebanon, called Bayrut Fil Layl (Beirut by Night) . His father, the artist Hassan El-Meligui, advised him to keep art a hobby and have a day job, which he did, more or less. His father's idea, not unreasonably, was that full-time art makes one vulnerable to the needs of the art market, and thus may dilute the content of one's art. The path El-Meligui followed in singing is similar to that taken by the all-time great musician Sayed Darwish. For the two men, a song has to have a message, and the message should say something about the country and its poor and neglected classes. Sayed Darwish (1892-1923) burned like a shooting star on Egypt's music scene, dying in his 20s, but only after changing the course of Egyptian art. El-Meligui turned to music as a career in his 30s after having matured as a person and artist. El-Meligui's musical journey matches that of the country's social and political life. Some think he styled himself after the famous duo, poet Ahmed Fouad Negm and singer-songwriter Sheikh Imam, who took the country by storm in the 1960s and 1970s. El-Meligui himself denies any association with Negm and Imam, saying that the latter had clear leftist aspirations, while he sings for all people, from across political spectrum, from all social strata, and especially for the downtrodden. El-Meligui is overjoyed when he hears people calling him a "voice of conscience". The concert I attended at the Al-Sawy Culture Wheel was called Ghayyar Huruf Al-Ghona (Change the Letters of Songs). This is also the title of El-Meligui's best known song and of his first CD. The song is almost a manifesto for artistic revolution, a cry for all artists to break free from the boundaries of traditional song, from the themes of love and forlornness. The lyrics for the key song, written by the poet Mohamed El-Komi, goes thus: "Walk in the back alleys, and you'll find different people, people who want to raise their boy, people who want to marry off their two daughters." El-Meligui obviously wants to draw attention to the simple people, the salt of the earth, those who struggle to make ends meet. Another song, with lyrics by the poet Ahmed Qadri, runs: "In the streets, a dream of a bright day, shines in the eyes of good people, a dream washed in bitterness, a dream with a wounded song." This type of singing is only a step away from country music. No wonder Sayed Darwish's famous song Al-Helwa di Qamet Taegen (This Beauty Kneads Bread), was reincarnated by El-Meligui and his band. He sings a spoof of the Darwish song written by the poet Zeinat El-Qalyubi, which goes: "This beauty went to knead, but had no flour, and the rooster, troubled by poverty, forgot his song, and if you, Sayed [Darwish], want to visit us once a year, our advice for you is to stay away, for our seas drown people." Sufi oldies of the likes of Sheikh Sayed El-Naqshabandi are also one of El-Meligui's trademarks, but he adds his own modern Muslim interpretations. Singing lyrics by the poet Osama Abdel-Sabour, El-Meligui croons: "Muslim I am in intent, not in letting my beard grow long and wearing robes, I fast and pray and give alms, and cry for other people's suffering." The folk song, Ya Henna, Ya Henna, Ya Qatr El-Nadda (O Henna", "O Henna, O dripping dew", also got a facelift when poet Mohamed El-Komi rewrote its lyrics and El-Meligui gave it a modern tune. El-Meligui sings about everything that happens in the country. After the sectarian clashes in Alexandria, his hometown, he had to take a stand, singing lyrics by the poet Ahmed Qadri, "We dream together, have fun together, and care for each other; we love too much, dawn to dusk, living under a single sun; Egypt our country, like a camel, carries everyone on its back." Singing lyrics by the poet El-Komi, El-Meligui comments on political changes in the United States, "Obama, Obama, a black man in the White House, what's all the fuss about, things will remain the same, do you get it?" For the besieged Gaza, El-Meligui sings the following lyrics by Qadri: "You who injured goodness, you who have hid the light of the moon, the hearts of birds have softened, and your hearts are made of stone." Paying tribute to the city in which he lived for so long, El-Meligui sings a famous song by Fayrouz, Lebayrut (To Beirut). It was once his dream that he and his brother, Ali, would become the new Rahbani brothers, the talented musicians who wrote most of Fayrouz's songs. It was not to be. The lyrics for El-Meligui songs come from this small circle of poets: Ahmed Qadri, Osama Abdel-Sabour, Mohamed El-Komi, Alaa Nabil Tammam and Zeinat Qalyubi. All are close friends of El-Meligui and share the same ideals and artistic mood. On stage El-Meligui is a ball of energy, and he knows how to put his soul in every line and imbue every melody with atavistic power. His band is made up solely of young musicians at the beginning of their careers, the right people to chart new path in Egypt's music scene.
