Rania Khallaf enjoys a night with Lebanese singer Rima Khcheich It is spring; time for music and art performances at the Geneina Theatre, time for real entertainment. Last Friday, the Geneina (Garden) Theatre presented a concert by the distinguished Lebanese singer Rima Khcheich. Although Khcheich had visited Egypt several times before this is the first time she stands on the Geneina stage and meets "its distinguished, naughty audience", as Basma El-Husseini, general manager of Al-Mawred Al-Thaqafi, the event organiser, phrased it. And it is very true, for it is almost only young people, intellectuals, and foreigners who make up the Geneina Theatre audience. The show began almost 45 minutes late, and it was raining -- only a light rain, but it was enough for the audience to grow anxious. The 500-seat open air theatre was full, and some members of the audience sat on the ground. Khcheich's appearance was brilliant. Wearing a long purple dress and a big smile she looked awesome, and friendly. "I am so happy to be here with you tonight," she said in a cheerful tone. She chatted easily with the audience between songs, moving from traditional Egyptian songs by Sayed Darwish and Um Kalthoum to Lebanese songs by Wadie Al-Safi, and then changed the mood with singing muwashahat. This night, she presented for the first time in Egypt a unique and unconventional duet with the Dutch double bassist Tony Overwater, who interacted with a wonderful feeling for traditional Arab music. When I met Khcheich at her hotel in Zamalek the day before the performance, she was as sociable as if she were receiving me in her own home. This told much about her personality. "This might be my seventh visit to Egypt, I am in love with this country, and I believe it has brought us the most distinguished voices ever," Khcheich said. Her musical idol is the late Egyptian singer and composer Mohamed Abdel-Wahab, followed by Um Kalthoum and Fayrouz on an equal footing. "I was lucky enough to meet Abdel-Wahab. This meeting will remain engraved in my memory. I think of it as a dream, but I have photographs of myself with him so it was not a dream," she giggles. Khcheich began her career at the age of nine. A graduate of the American University in Beirut where she studied communications, and the National Conservatoire of Music where she has taught for the last 10 years, Khcheich has performed live throughout the Middle East, Europe and the United States, specialising in a traditional Arab vocal repertoire. Khcheich's tutor at the conservatoire was the Lebanese singer Mohamed Zein. Asked what made her decide to initiate this unconventional musical experience with Overwater, she says: "You know, in life it happens that you meet people that drive you somewhere else. In 1998, I met a group of Dutch musicians in Beirut where they were taking part in a Dutch music festival. We had a 30-minute jam with some difficult songs like ' Ana haweet wi intaheet ' by Sayed Darwish, and it was very successful." This was the start of her infusion experience, after which she was invited to Holland along with two Iraqi musicians: one playing the jawzeh, a traditional Iraqi instrument, and the other on percussion. "We had a successful tour in Holland," Khcheich says. "My first album, Orient Express, was recorded live during that visit. Since then I have found myself interested in Jazz and modern music. "There is a kind of link between traditional Arab music and Jazz, since they both rely on improvisation and vocals, and this sad and nostalgic touch. So I started this fusion thing, presenting muwashahat, in a different, Jazz-like musical form. "I have produced two other albums, the solo album Yalalaly in 2006, which includes music by Ziad Rahbani on piano and the Tony Overwater on double bass, with compositions especially composed for me, as well as muwashahat rearranged in a modern style," she adds. Last year Khcheich released her latest album, Falak, on which she collaborated with great Dutch jazz musicians such as Yuri Honing on saxophone, Maarten Van der Grinten on guitar and Tony Overwater on double bass. Falak includes new compositions as well as old songs by Sayed Darwish and Wadie El-Safi. "Falak will come to Egypt soon," she said, "I do not have a producer for my albums. I have done that for myself. This is why my albums are not very well distributed on the Arab market. Commercial music is more prevalent nowadays and I am struggling, but I think I am on the right track." "I believe that singing muwashahat in a modern style brings a "different", not "bigger" audience, more of young people. During my solo singing career my audience were older people who liked traditional singing. Now I am happy with my new audience. And this is just great, because young people will enjoy muwashahat and traditional Arab songs more in this form." Khcheich also came from a family of music lovers. "My parents are really into music," she says. "My father used to play the qanoun, and, as a child, my home was like a studio for Arab music." She had studied with the Lebanese Maestro Selim Sahab before he came to Cairo to establish the Um Kalthoum Musical Ensemble. "I still remember the first time he conducted a concert here in Egypt. It was in 1988, at the Sayed Darwish Theatre, I was 13, and I sang in the chorus as a guest. "Many years later I returned to Egypt to meet late Egyptian composer Fouad Abdel-Meguid El-Mistikawi. He was a great artist who composed modern muwashahat. After he died I came to Egypt and I bought seven of his muwashahat from his family." Khcheich sang some of these at her concert. Whether she has plans with other Egyptian composers is not decided. "Everything is possible. I am open to all modern musical trends," she says. Haflet Taraf (Luxury Party) is one of her rare video clips available on YouTube. The clip is produced by the distinguished Lebanese director Shadi Youssef, who also wrote the song, one of her lighter numbers, which criticises the social and political circumstances in Lebanon today. "It is one of my best songs," she says. Khcheich is a regular visitor to the United States, where she teaches voice and classical Arab singing at the Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts within the framework of the Arab Music Retreat programme directed by renowned musician and composer Simon Shahin. "The Arab music week, is a programme organised every August by Shahin," she says. "It attracts Arab, European and American musicians. At the end of this week, students have to perform a musical piece. It is a great experience for me to work with American musicians, and to realise how much they appreciate our music. "Working with Overwater has been equally interesting. He has been into Arab music for 10 years now," she adds. The 90-minute Friday show is over, to my surprise, I have become a great lover of traditional Arab music. It is a type of music that had rarely crossed my path. Now I am running out to buy one of Khcheich's albums, if not all of them
