Among the Jasmine Trees: Music and Modernity in Contemporary Syria

SIX: Tarab, Sentiment, and Authenticity

158    Œ Tarab,Sentiment,andAuthenticity  Maœtla⁄: œTarab and Samna It is a late autumn day in Damascus, and I am back paying a visit to my friend ⁄ÂAdil al-Zakµı, owner of the ShÂam DÂan cassette shop. Mr. Zakµı has “everything”in his shop, including nearly a million recordings in a variety of formats, mostly cassettes, of older Arab music and music from around the world. Zakµı is a jocular man, somewhat round of belly and quick of smile, and a great enthusiast of Arab music—the “good music,”as he would put it, and not the modern popular songs for which he has little regard. Whenever I visited him, I generally would sit for an hour or so while we listened to various artists—whomever he happened to be making a tape of at the time, or others according to his mood: the great Egyptian artists Umm KulthÂum and Muœhammad ⁄Abd al-WahhÂab, of course, but also Indonesian Qur‹Âan readers, Persian oud players, all-women orchestras from Tunisia, and others both famous and obscure. We’d sip little glasses of coffee, sit back in our chairs, and enjoy the music—as we did that autumn afternoon. I have come to get some cassettes of songs by Aleppine composers recorded by Aleppo Radio in the 1950s and 1960s. When I ask Zakµı if he has anything by Aleppine composers, he says, “Uncle, I have everything! Who are you looking for?”1 He then rattles off a long list of names and has his son bring down several boxes of tapes from the shelves, each precisely numbered, catalogued, and arranged according to the artist or genre.2 Peering through the boxes, he selects some tapes for me and begins putting them in a tape player so we can listen to them. As Muœhammad Khairµı sings about lost love, Zakµı exclaims, “What a voice!” and waves his arms around in a gesture familiar to aficionados of Arab 6. œTarab, Sentiment, and Authenticity 159 music. “ŒHilÂu,” I add, “Sweet.”3 “Do you want to hear some real œtarab?” he asks me. Of course I do, and he says, “Here’s an old-time singer from Homs, not well known, but he could really sing!”and he puts in a cassette. The tape is a recording from the 1950s of ⁄Abd al-WÂaœhid ShÂawµısh, a vocalist from the central Syrian city of Homs. He is singing a qaœsµıda and when he finishes each phrase the audience on the tape bursts into oohs, aahs, and shouts of encouragement —like Zakµı’s arm-waving, typical œtarab responses. Zakµı is all smiles as he leans back in his chair, his hands moving ever so slightly along with the singer—a shadow conductor of the emotions. When the song is over, he turns to me and asks, “Well? Isn’t is good?” and I respond by shaking my head in amazement and saying “Very nice!” I ask if there were others like ShÂawµısh in Homs and elsewhere in the 1950s, aside from the big names from Aleppo and Damascus, and he says “There were a lot, but now there aren’t that many voices like that—that can cause œtarab.” He adds, “there are only a handful today, nothing like the old days.” “Why?” I ask. Leaning back in his chair and patting his paunch, he says, “The reason is that today no one eats enough fat.”I look surprised, so he continues. ⁄ÂAdil al-Zakµı in his store, Damascus, 2004. 160     Look, Uncle. In the old days, we used to eat samna baladµı (clarified butter), but today everyone eats Mazola. It’s just not the same! You need fat to have a good voice. God made sheep so that for every 15 kilos of meat you have 5 of fat. That’s one-third fat—33 percent. We need to eat fat! Today all these singers are skinny and their voices weak. So how can they cause œtarab? They need to eat more samna! He laughs with a sparkle in his eye that says he is only half joking. I collect my tapes and leave. Over the coming weeks, I can’t help noticing that many of the good artists, old and young, appear to be a little fat. Do they eat samna? Is this the secret...