Money talks in the Arabic music world, now more than ever. Serene Assir reports on the virtual monopoly of production and distribution In the global music industry, everything comes down to the power of money, and Egypt's popular music scene is no different. After all, Cairo is the capital of the Arabic music world; where else can you hear music on every bridge and backstreet, in every car and taxi, in every shop and café, almost without exception? And the role that musicians, singers and lyricists play in the emotional and cultural lives of people from all walks of life is unusually prominent. But recently, many have been complaining. "All the songs sound the same," complains Mohamed, who works in a fteer restaurant in downtown Cairo. "There is no art left in them, no soul. One musician pops up after another, and simply copies the work of those who have had success in the past. It's all rubbish." And although Cairo does boast a relatively strong underground music scene, the proliferation of samizdat art in the West during the 1980s and 1990s is still to hit the Arab world. For now, Egypt has only one radio station which focusses exclusively on broadcasting Arabic pop music "Nugoom FM" and mass distribution is reserved for artists who work directly with one of the few production companies who have the capital and power to push them to the pinnacle of success. In other words, you'd better strike a deal with Rotana "the Saudi-owned music business giant that counts Amr Diab among its stars" or Alam Al-Phan "the venerable but still powerful Egyptian company that has recently signed up Mustafa Amar and Samira Said" or else your chances of ever being heard by anyone but your friends are slim. "Music has changed enormously over the past two years," songwriter Mustafa Lutfi told Al- Ahram Weekly. "This is mostly because the relationship between money and art has itself changed." After years of resistance to globalisation by purists, technology has finally found its way into Arabic music. "Before all these changes that everyone's talking about took place," says Said Imam, production manager for Rotana in Egypt, "globalisation happened. When Melody TV, the first Arab satellite music channel, was launched, young people were exposed for the first time to pop music from the West. Western and Arabic songs were broadcast one after the other, and people, naturally, compared the quality of the sound and the pictures, and the power of the concepts they conveyed. As a result, audiences became much more demanding." It was the link between sound and image created by the videoclip that revolutionised what we now hear in Cairo's streets and homes. Despite the fact that over 50 per cent of Egyptians live just on or below the poverty line, the proliferation of satellite TV has been astoundingly rapid and widespread. Old rules gave way to new ones -- the focus on melody went out, and in its place came a focus on rhythm. Throughout the 1980s, "the rhythm produced in studios was the (syncopated) maqsum beat -- the traditional Arabic beat," Ali Al- Meligi, production manager of Alam Al-Phan, told the Weekly. "You can only hear so much of that when you've heard RnB, hip hop, house and reggae." Studios proliferated, and whereas in the old days the power of the final product lay in the relation between singer, songwriter, lyricist and instrumentalists, now the final product is defined by the imagination of the sound engineer. It is in his power that lies the choice of rhythm, mood and ultimately, creativity. "Everyone knows that the Arabic music tradition is among the richest, most complex and most beautiful in the world," Lutfi says. "But where Arabic songs were lacking was in production technique, and for that you need money. You can have the best sound engineer working on a song, but if he has bad equipment, a poorly equipped studio and old programmes, the song will be a failure." Al-Meligi agrees: "Arrangement and production have become infinitely more advanced." And with audiences thirsty for change, what else can you change but production technique? "When Western listeners sought a departure from traditional subjects, for example, artists started debating drugs, social inequality and politics in their music. Here, in the Arab world, our societies impose restrictions in that respect. So we stick to the old subjects, love and separation from the lover. Anything else is commercially unviable," argues Imam. Not everyone agrees, among them lyricist Ahmed Marzouk. "We've lived in fear for so long that we've got used to it," he laments. "The commercial music market has been captured by just two or three companies, which have managed to take over or break their competitors by their sheer financial muscle. As a result, pop music has become completely facile." Al-Meligi confirms this analysis. "We try and appeal to as wide an audience as possible, regardless of class or taste, with every song we make." And if there is one common experience which links us all, "It's love," notes Imam. Considering that the illiteracy rate in Egypt is still a staggering 30 per cent, "How complex do you think songs can be if they're going to be hits?" asks Marzouk. While the mega-production companies capitalise on their successes, they do not rely solely on direct income from sales. Fortunately for, as Marzouk told the Weekly, "the cassette industry is technically dead." With Internet cafés sprouting up on the corner of practically every street in Cairo, people no longer buy albums. "They just download all the songs they want. At most, they spend LE2.50 for a pirate copy on the black market." Indeed, the rumour in music circles has it that while Amr Diab's popularity has vastly increased over recent years, five or six years ago his sales peaked at 350,000 copies, while his latest "Leily Nhary" has only sold 225,000. The relative advantage of companies such as Rotana lies in the fact that they have the muscle to advertise on satellite music TV channels, including Rotana TV and Alam Al-Phan's Mazzika TV. They have also shifted their marketing policy by selling secondary products, such as ringtones, which have been enormously successful throughout the Arab world. In addition, it is an open secret that the major stockholders in Alam Al-Phan also hold shares in Rotana, and vice versa. The fact that the two companies are interlinked means that they can afford to speculate, rather than simply follow the economics of supply and demand. Marzouk summarises the situation thus: "Expensive music, few direct returns." Only corporate giants can afford such a formula. Not all is bleak, though, in the landscape of Arabic music. There is still Free Music, owned by Nasr Mahrous, which has signed artists such as Tamer Hosni and Shireen, and "which has survived the arrival of Rotana because its focus is on creativity," according to Marzouk. And since the contemporary pop world focusses on novelty, many young people have been able to find fame, a feat which would have been virtually impossible in the exclusive and elitist music world of yesteryear. "The music world is now a busy, busy place, with lots of competition and energy," Lutfi told the Weekly. "All musical forms are being mixed together here and now, and this can only be musically positive. Perhaps this is just the impetus that we needed to break with the ties of tradition! Now we need to complete our liberation by becoming truly independent from both form and money this time around and thus set music free."
