Raquy Danziger's Blog

Istanbul Adventures - February 2012

2012-02-08T06:26:00.016-05:00

Istanbul Blog Feb 8th 2012-02-08

It’s amazing to me that I’ve been here almost a whole month. I feel like this is the happiest time of my life. I wake up every day full of joy, excitement and gratitude for this incredible opportunity life is offering me. I savour every day here in Istanbul as a precious gift.

The Best Antraman Ever!!!!!
The antraman this year has been intense! Now that we have a beautiful, comfortable , smoke free place to practice, Bunyamin and I are practicing like crazy.

I’ve had a few hard days with practicing, when I feel like I’m swimming upstream – that everything is a struggle, that nothing is sounding quite right, that my body and mind aren’t relaxed. When I see the speed and dexterity of the other guys I feel discouraged and hopeless of ever getting to that level. I witness such beauty effortlessly streaming out of Bunyamin – such mastery, perfection and pure expression and I feel frustrated and impatient that I’m not there.
Sometimes when I’m playing with Bunyamin I have a mental image of a mother giraffe (Bunyamin) walking so beautifully and gracefully with no effort, and the baby giraffe (me) stumbling along trying to imitate its mother. I get insulted when he tells me the things that I always tell my students – that I need to be more relaxed, slow things down and articulate more. I’m like “That’s what I say to MY students! You shouldn’t have to tell me that!”
On such days the best thing is to leave the studio early have a shot of Raki and chill- maybe go hear some live music and dance a little or go home and read my awesome murder mystery book that takes place in Istanbul.

However, most of the days at the studio I’m absolutely soaring. I realized the importance of arriving at the studio a couple hours before Bunyamin so that I have some time to go over stuff by myself. Then by the time he arrives I’m all warmed up!
I’ve had several realizations about the hand position that has taken my playing to a whole different level. My rolls are getting so flowing and smooth and my ability to come up with cool solo phrases is improving daily. The drummers who come to the studio regularly can’t believe my progress. Ibrahim yesterday was saying that he can’t imagine how I’ll be playing after 4 months of this! My biggest compliment is that everyone’s been saying that I’m sounding more and more like Bunyamin.

When other drummers are there we spend a good amount of time “jamming” where everyone is holding a rhythm and everybody gets a turn to do four measures of solo. It used to be that as soon as my turn was over I’d spend the whole cycle planning what I was going to do on my next turn.
Now I have a different approach which is so much better! I don’t plan AT ALL. Whatever I do is a direct response to the person who goes right before me. Either I imitate him or contrast him or do a variation on his thing, but whatever it is, it must have something to do with what he did. It makes the drum circle so much more enjoyable! I can actually listen to everybody else because I’m not so busy planning. I also am more connected to what’s happening around me since I’m responding to a spontaneous phrase as opposed to planning my own thing. I end up doing phrases that are new and refreshing when I get out of my own head! I’m so happy about this new approach! I encourage everyone to try it next time you are jamming with people.

Because our studio is so nice and comfortable, many of the Turkish drummers have made it their daily hang out – yesterday there were ten drummers who just happened to stop by and spent all evening there! Everybody brings snacks so we are bombarded with nuts and dried fruit and chocolate and cookies and stuffed grape leaves and of course Turkish Delight. It’s nice, but it’s been getting a little too much, so some days when they call Bunyamin tells them”Sorry, today Raquy and are working on our composition – come tomorrow”, because when everyone is there we don’t work on or composition.

Chai

The Turkish Chai (Tea) is a huge thing. There is a certain way that Turks may tea. They are very picky about it. One day I was like “I’ll make the tea” and I started doing it and three different people ran over to me frantically giving instructions about how to do it. So now I know and am officially qualified to make the tea. It’s very bitter and strong and they serve it in these cute little glasses. I’d say Bunyamin drinks about 15 of those every day. One day the tea pot broke and it was a big crisis. Bunyamin was on the phone for hours trying to get a friend to bring another one! Thank god the next day we got another one!

My Awesome Saz Player!!!

I started a new duet project here, saz and kemenche, with a wonderful saz player named Orhan Bilge. He's awesome and his studio is right next door to ours so we rehearse a few times a week. He's learning my compositions and it's turning out soooo beautiful! Saz and kemenche are just gorgeous together! Plus he's a really nice guy and not so bad to look at either! Right now we're just rehearsing but I hope we'll do some show in a couple months!

My Tantrums at TurkCell
Every time I come back to Turkey my cell phone doesn’t work and I have to have two or three tantrums at the TurkCell office.
I’ve come to look forward to these tantrums. This year I had to go so many times it became a part of my daily routine – have breakfast, study Turkish, go to TurkCell and have a tantrum, go antraman, ect. It was so much fun.
Unfortunately after about 12 visits this year, my I phone is working perfectly as a Turkish phone, so I have no more excuses to go back, I hope something will stop working soon.

My Laaz Kemenche Friend

When you walk up and down Istiklal, the pedestrian walkway you see amazing musicians all along the way. My favorite is this Laaz guy from the Black Sea who plays the pontic kemenche. I love him. One day I mentioned to him that I play to so he immediately handed me his kemenche, had me sit down in his seat and told me “I need a break – bye!” and left.
Fortunately I know how to play one song on the pontic kemenche so I sat there for a while and played that song over and over (people are walking by so its okay to play the same song on repeat) and made a little money for him. It was so much fun!

My Mom is Coming!
After four years of me living part time in Istanbul I finally convinced my mama to come visit! She has work to do on her Masters degree, so I can still antraman while she’s here. I’m so excited to show her my favorite city! She’s coming Feb 18th for 6 days. I think she’s gonna love it here!!!

First week Back in Istanbul, 2012!

2012-01-24T09:27:00.021-05:00

Beautiful reunion after not seeing each other for 9 months!

I'm back in Istanbul, my favorite place on earth! This is my fourth year in a row spending the winter here and I find myself falling in love with this city more and more each time. I keep extending my trip each time. The first year I stayed one month, the second, two months, the third three months and this year, I'll be here for four whole months!
Since it is 2012 and may be the last year of the world as we know it I decided to go all out this time and spare no expense to make it the most magical experience ever.

My Bohemian Flat with Murals

My kemenche is right at home in my new place!

This is the first year that I'm living in my own place without my students. I must say I LOVE having my own place. I found it on airbnb which is an incredible site for finding places to stay in foreign countries. The flat is on my favorite street, a 5 minute walk from Emin Percussion and the music street and a 15 minute stroll down the beautiful pedestrian walkway, Istiklal, to get to Bunyamin's practice studio. Basically I never see a car.
It's an adorable one bedroom apartment that is in a gorgeous old building but has been lovingly renovated to be sooo comfortable without losing the exotic charm. The heat works great, there is an awesome shower with hot water, the kitchen is small but totally workable and there are beautiful kilims and pillows with seating on the floor just how I like it. And the walls in the living room have beautiful murals! I felt at home as soon as I stepped into this place! It's totally inspiring!

Bunyamin's Slick Antraman Studio

He's so happy in his new studio!

When I first met my teacher Bunyamin four years ago he had an "office" which he used for practicing. He was like the King there - it was the place for all of the best drummers to get together and jam. Then he lost the place and for the last couple years he didn't have his own space.
This year I decided to splurge and help him get a new office. He took it a couple months before I arrived and spent some time painting it blue and preparing everything so by the time I arrived it was all ready.
He is so happy there! He is there every day from 4pm till the early morning. He installed a heater so its super cozy. He put candles all over the place and burns incense. When I first arrived it was so cute - he couldn't stop putzing around - making tea, adjusting the heat, adjusting the lighting cleaning, ect. I've never met anyone so neat and clean. He fanatically cleans and mops the place every day!
It's the perfect place to practice- there's a big rug and pillows for those like me who like to sit on the floor (and it's awesome for practicing yoga as well!) All of the great drummers have been coming by every day to practice. And here's the best thing about it - NO SMOKING!!!!!! I think it's the first time in history that a Turkish drummer has a no smoking policy in his practice studio! Whoever wants to smoke is kindly asked to do so on the balcony! What a pleasure to practice and breathe clean air! Plus he has a no shoes policy! It's sooo awesome!!!

Bunyamin is Flying
Ever since he got the studio Bunyamin has been practicing more than ever. His level now is completely off the charts - nobody can believe it, including the other amazing Turkish drummers. His hand have just become one big blur. We are slowly putting together a new composition based on the stuff he's coming up with - mostly in 9, but some cool stuff in 7 as well.

The other day Suat Borozan came over to practice and after complaining that he never has time to practice anymore proceeded to completely kick my butt playing this stuff in unison about three times as fast as I could. I love it - there's nothing like a good challenge! But even though I'm still not as fast as these guys, everyone here noticed that my level is much better than last year - I guess all of those drill series and office hours are paying off!

Bunyamin and Suat Jamming

Today Mehmet Akatay is coming! This other guy Ibrahim comes almost every day as well as this guy Tarik who plays tabla.

Lessons!
A couple people have already come with me this year. Yufi and Sam who were with me last year came back again! They've both been taking lessons from Bunyamin. Also Osama Farouk, perhaps the best Arabic style drummer living in America came just for a few days,but he took a lesson from Bunyamin as well! It was beautiful to see them jamming together, masters of two very different styles!

Osama having his lesson

My Routine
I still haven't really adjusted from New York time, so I have to drag myself out of bed at 1pm. After meditation I take a walk around the neighborhood. First I stop at Emin Percssion to have a tea and see who's jamming. Then I got to my juice guy and get a pomegranate juice and say hi to the Galata Tower. There are so many cute little cafe's all around my house - my mission is to try them all. I sit at one of the cafes and study Turkish. Then I go back home and practice kemenche and throat singing for a few hours. Then I walk down Istiklal, the beautiful pedestrian walkway to go to Bunyamin's studio. I try to take different little side streets each time - there are so many quaint little ally ways to explore!
From 6ish till late late night, it's basically practicing with Bunyamin and friends with a short break for dinner. After a few years of being here, I now know where to get amazing food. The salads here are absolutely stunning and ridiculously cheap. When I'm here I live on raw veggis, beans and dried fruit and nuts.

One of my favorite places to eat

At around 2 am Bunyamin and I go back to my place and "fig out" - we make a pot of hibiscus tea and snack on dried figs and nuts. After he falls asleep, since I'm still jet lagged, I do my yoga practice and go to sleep at around 5. I hope I'll adjust and get on a slightly more normal schedule, but there is something I'm enjoying about this vampire - like existence!

New Project!
Since I plan to spend more and more time in Istanbul I want to start a musical project here. I've been dreaming for years of finding a saz player to learn my compositions. It just so happens that the studio next door to Bunyamin's is owned by a saz player! It turns out he studied with Erdal Erzincan, the saz player who plays with Kayhan Kalhoor! I gave him a cd of my music and tomorrow we will have our first session playing together.

Drama on the West Coast Tour!

2011-09-18T17:45:00.007-04:00

Usually I only keep a blog when I’m having my adventures in the Middle East, but I’m on a west coast tour with Raquy and the Cavemen and there has been such drama that I feel compelled to write about it.

Drama #1 – No Passport
So the plan was for us to fly in to Seattle and for Euphrates to pick us up and take us up to Van Couvar.
However, after driving 14 hours she realized she hadn’t taken her passport! In her defence, she had come straight from Burning Man where she spent all night flogging people and didn’t get any sleep.
We quickly recovered from this first drama by changing the plan – Euphrates would stay in Seattle with a friend while we took her car to Van Couvar and she would meet us a couple days later after her mom sent her her passport.

Drama #2 – Fishky Disappears
Euphrates finally made it to Van Couvar just in time for my advanced dumbek workshop. Fishky wanted to practice back at the house where we were staying so he said he would pick us up at 9:15 when the workshop was over.
9:15, the workshop ends and no Fishky. We wait for 20 minutes and no Fishky. “That’s strange”, I thought. Although he is a wild crazy musician he is always extremely organized and reliable when it comes to being places on time during the tour.
“Maybe he fell asleep at the house” we thought. We picked up some Indian food and another friend brought us back to the house.
We get to the house and still no Fishky. I try to call him and his phone is turned off. I start worrying. Euphrates says, “ lets just eat, I’m sure he’s fine!” but by this point I was starting to freak out and had no appetite. “He would never just disappear like this on tour”, I thought, “Something terrible must have happened!”
I start looking for clues. I see that his Dum Set is only half set up. “What does that mean? Why would he set up half of his Dum Set? Did he leave the house in a rush?”
Another hour goes by and I start seriously freaking out, so I called the Van Couvar police station. Here’s the conversation:

Me: My friend is missing!
Police: How old is he?”
Me: 32
Police: When was the last time you saw him?
Me: Three hours ago
Police: (After some silence) He’s 32 and you saw him 3 hours ago and you’re reporting him missing?”
Me: But he would never just disappear like this! Something terrible must have happened!”

At this point we hear the car drive up and Fishky comes upstairs throatsinging.

Me: Never mind, he’s back

It turns out he was at an ice cream parlour with 80 different flavors and it took him so long because he was having trouble deciding.

Drama #3 – Turkish Delight
Euphrates got me the best gift for the tour – a book called “Making Out in Turkish” about how to flirt and date and have relationships in Turkish, which I predict will prove extremely useful during my upcoming winter pilgrimage to Istanbul.

As luck would have it, we happened to be double billing in Van Couvar with an ADORABLE Turkish DJ! Sooooo cute! He was gracious enough to only speak to me in Turkish although his English is perfect. It proved the perfect opportunity to try out some of the phrases from the book!

Drama # 4 – My Kemenche gets smashed on stage

While I was in the dressing room before the show in Twisp Washington, apparently a lamp fell on my 12 string kemenche tarhu and crushed the bridge. Nobody who saw the fall realized that it had been broken.

We began the show with drumming and then I picked up my kemenche to play a song, saw that it was broken and screamed in front of the whole audience.

Some backgound about my kemenche. There are only two of them in the world. They are made by Peter Biffen in Australia, who now has a three year waiting list if you want to order a new one. The design is extremely unusual and complicated so any normal oud or violin repair man would be terrified to touch the thing.

Fishky and I were stunned – I’ve often had nightmares that I’m on stage and my kemenche is broken. I felt like I was dreaming. We were just beginning our tour – what will we do for the rest of the tour?

“Is there a Luthier in the house” Fishky desperately asked the audience.

Suddenly one of the most beautiful men I’ve ever seen in the front row says, “I’m a Luthier, let me have a look!” He was like an angel sent from heaven with the most incredible eyes.

He took the kemenche to the dressing room and proceeded to operate while Euphrates and I looked on hugging each other and weeping, In the meantime Fishky played some of his solo pieces.

Miraculously this stunning man got the maker of the kemenche in Australia on the phone and with his advise put it back together so that I could use it for the rest of the tour! And I was actually able to go back on stage and finish the show!

I’ll still have to send it back to Australia for a more permanent fix, but in the meantime it’s sounding better than ever and I have a new appreciation of my instrument.

I can’t wait until I’m rich and famous enough so that I can bring the luthier from Twisp with me on all of my tours just in case!

By the way , Euphrates and I usually have opposite taste in men and the exact same taste in food, making for the perfect friendship, but this was the first time we both agreed that the luthier in Twisp is absolutely dreamy!

Istanbul Feb 7th 2011

2011-02-07T09:06:00.010-05:00

Well I’m almost halfway through the Istanbul part of my Middle Eastern Winter Adventure! I can’t believe how fast this trip is flying by! I still wake up every day thinking, “oh goody, another day in Istanbul! What a treat!

Poor Egypt!
For the past six years I’ve spent a good part of my year in Egypt. Last year was the first time I officialy had a dumbek retreat in the magical Sinai Desert, and it was such a success that I was planning to do it again this year.

But now there is a revolution happening in Egypt. I hope that this revolution will lead to better times for the Egyptian people but in the meantime its a big mess and there’s no way I can bring a group over there. My friend Marjory is a journalist in Cairo for the AP. I just skyped with her and she is determined to stick it out and not be intimidated by Moobaraks thugs! She now refers to her apartment as “Revolution Headquarters”. Go Marjory!!!!

I decided to make the best out of the situation and instead of canceling I moved the retreat to Istanbul! I’m actually getting really excited about bringing my students to my favorite city, introducing them to the greatest dumbek players on the planet and showing them the rich turkish culture! For more info about the istanbul retreat check out http://www.raquy.com/retreats/images/istanbulposter2011.jpg

Pistachio Thumb
The best snack for practcing is dried figs and pistachios. SOmething about the combination of the sweet mushy figs and the crunchy salty pistachios is so addictive and gives amazing energy for practicing!
But unfortunately, Euphrates and I have both been afflicted with an ailement that I’ve named it “pistachio thumb”. It happens when you eat way to many pistachio nuts so that the nail on your thumb with which you pry the pistachios open actually breaks. In this condition, it’s almost impossible to open your own nuts so you need to have a friend open them for you (until the friend gets “pistachio thumb”!)

Going Away Party for Sam
The day be fore Sam left to go back home we had our first (and probably last) big party at our place! It was really fun. We had a few celebrities such as Okay Temiz, Emin (of Emin Percussion) and of course Bunyamin!
During the jamming I was experimenting with holding a throat singing droaning under someone’s solo. I thought it was working great, but for some reason every time I started throat singing, Emin would throw popcorn at me!

Here is some footage of us jamming at the party:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUZRBzkpDj4

Classical Music Gig
My friend David Kucherman was supposed to come to Istanbul to play this classical baroque concert with and orchestra. At the last minute he hurt his neck so he asked if I could substitute for him! So I find myself playing dumbek and frame drums in this orchestra with a conductor! What a flashback into my past! It was fine, but boy did it make me glad that I’m playing my own original music!

Our Restaurant
Euphrates and I found the BEST restaurant! They have this thing called mixed vegetable platter and every day there is a different variety of delicious vegan vegetable dishes. The guy likes us alot so he gives us extra free food every time and tops off our wine glasses. And the wine glasses keep getting bigger and bigger! The last time we went there was like a half bottle of wine in each glass!

Euphrates is doing great! Her Turkish split hand technique is getting really good! She's been taking privates with Bunyamin! She's also fallen in love with the yayli tambur. She composed a beautiful piece on the yayli tambur one day after she started playing the instrument!

Feb 6,2011 Istanbul!

Adama
Remember Adama from the 2009 Istanbul blog? Well look what happened! She had an adorable half Turkish baby! It is soooo cute! She lives in England now but she was visiting Istanbul so I got to hang our with her and her baby. What a cute family!

Stupid Triplets
When will my triplets ever sound like Bunyamin’s???!!!!????!!!??? Somtimes I feel like they are really coming along and sounding good but then Bunyamin walks into the room and I lose it completely. I don’t think I’ve ever worked so hard on anything as much as I work on those stupid triplets. It is so hard to make them even and clear! If you are in the least bit tense it all goes to shit. I really hope that one day they will sound like Bunyamin’s and in the meantime all I can do is enjoy the process.

Istanbul 2011

2011-01-18T13:03:00.021-05:00

Greetings from Istanbul!

I’m back in the “Land of Antraman” and so far this is the best year yet! I have never been so in love with a city before. I wake up every morning with a huge smile on my face, so happy to be here in this beautiful exotic city that is home to the greatest dumbek players on earth and the sweetest people!

This year I came with two of my friends/ student, Sam and Euphrates.

Sam Tynker is an ADORABLE guy from New Mexico who makes his living as a circus performer. Some of you may have seen him at Pensic.

Euphrates was one of the students in my university dumbek class in Cairo, Egypt. She is an incredible fire spinner who just finished college. What a welcome into the real world, coming to Istanbul for the winter to practice dumbek!

We are renting two rooms at Studio Fabrica a music studio in the heart of the music discrict. I've been here for two weeks and have not had to take a single form of transportation other than walking. Everything is within walking distance - every music store, every music venue, all the great master musicians have their studios right around here. The building is full of music studios so we hear music all day long. Everyone practicing all day.

The studio is run by two brothers, Hakan and Vulkan (thats another thing I love about Istanbul. Everyone has names from Star Treck!) Hakan is a great darbuka player and Vulkan plays Turkish clarinet. There are musicians coming in and out of the studio all day long.

Here is a typical day for us
We wake up at noon, read some yoga sutras and sit in group meditation.

Then we go out for our morning excursion. First we have some pamogranate juice at a table outside facing the Galata Tower. Then we sit in a coffee place on a windy cobblestone street and study Turkish and then go to Emin Percussion the famous drum store/ drummer to hangout and practice with whoever happens to be there. Serdar works there. He used to study with Misirli Ahmet and he's very fun to practice with. He and I like to listen to Indian tabla rhythms and adapt them for dumbek.

Then we come back to the studio and practice. Euphrates and I begin by working on our Mongolian Throat Singing. Our friends here don't quite know what to make of it.

Bunyamin arrives every day at around 4. For those of you who don't know, Bunyamin is my teacher. I've been studying with him for two years now. I can't really describe the experience of seeing this man play in words other than "miraculous". I can't believe I get to sit and practice with this gifted being every day. Sometimes Euphrates and Sam have lessons with him but most often Bunyamin and I practice together. Lately he has been channeling so many incredible new ideas which I'm trying to organize into a new duet for us to perform. His ideas are flowing so fast I can barely keep up writing them all down!

Every evening there is a stunning sunset which I can see from my window overlooking the Galata Bridge. I just never get tired of watching the sun set behind the mosques with seagulls flying around.

I've shown Sam and Euphrates my secret Turkish Split Hand Technique Drill Series. They are obsessed and so the drills for hours every day.

A few times a week we go out to hear live music. There is incredible live music almost every night of the week, within walking distance from our place. Our more popular hang out is a place called "Araf" that has great Turkish bands.

We end each day with a late night yoga session starting at around 2am. Bedtime is around 4.

I'm finding more and more options for great vegan food. There's really some delicious veggis here! My latest discovery is "mercemek kofte" - these delicious balls made of lentils made to look like meatballs. And the salads are gorgeous. I'm still obsessed with simits, the Turkish style bagels.

As if it wasn't enough having two dumbek masters Bunyamin and Hakan practicing in our house every day, the virtuoso Suat Borazan has taken a liking to our place and also comes here to practice with us! We often end up all playing together trading off solos. What a humbling experience! But I'm happy to see that all the practicing has paid off - I can keep up much better that I could in the last trip.

Also, Hamdi Akatay, one of the fathers of the Turkish Split Hand Technique, has his group class right across the hall from us once a week, so we get to jam with him and his students!

Misirli Ahmet's studio is a five minute walk from my place. He's not accepting new students into his school now but he did promise me that he and I will practice together Friday at 6! Wish me luck!

So basically we are right in the heart of the Istanbul dumbek scene. I'm so grateful to be here and I can't believe the incredible opportunities we are having!

Istanbul, phase II

2009-04-06T17:08:00.003-04:00

So I decided to extend my stay in Istanbul until April 15th!!!!!

The Land of Antrenman

My teacher Bunyamin has been practicing with me like 8 hours a day! The other day my lesson went from 4pm to 4am! I feel like I’m in the next phase, because I studied with him for one month and then I practiced on my own in Egypt for a month, so coming back now, I can keep up with him much more! We are composing a sick ass duet together!

Finally! Meeting Missirli Ahmet and Levant

Yay! I finally got to meet Missirli Ahmet and Levant!

So a few nights ago was our show in istanbul and a bunch of missirli ahmets students showed up! They were soooo sweet and nice and ever since I've been hanging out with them! I get them drunk and then make them show me the stuff they're learning, hee hee.

So they had their lesson with him last night and they said they would tell him about me and ask if I could come meet him. So i was at Bunyamins and i get a message that I can come meet him!

So I went over to the school and I got to hang out with with Missirli Ahmet and Levant. They were very sweet to me and invited me to a party at their school the next day.

So I walked into the party and Levant was jamming. I must say, I’ve never seen dumbek playing like that. He was flying. I ended up staying until the morning and I had a nice bond with both Ahmet and Levant. Ahmet didn’t play but I got to jam with Levant. Everyone was very nice to me and made me feel welcome and I got compliments on my playing by Missiri Amet. Many of the students had seen my videos on you tube before so they really treated me like a celebrity!

Levant is based in Paris but he wants to come visit me in NY. I told him he can stay w me at my apartment if he agrees to practice with me every day and he said okay., so I hope all of you new york messengers get to meet him soon. who knows, maybe he’ll come on a retreat. We both speak French, Arabic and English, so we switch back and forth from three languages! He is very handsome and charming!

Motorcycle trip to the Black Sea

I was supposed to have a kemenche lesson the other day, and my teacher called me and said “it’s a beautiful day out – lets go on a motorcyle trip to the black sea instead” So I said yes, and he picked me up on his Harley and we rode along the Bosphorus all the way to the black sea stopping occasionally for tea and snacks. What a wonderful day!

My New Group of Friends

I love my new friends, the students of missirli ahmet. They are soo nice to me and next weekend one of them is having a bon voyage party for me!

Last Week in Egypt

2009-04-06T07:47:00.007-04:00

Sinai

Right after our concert we hired a mini van to take us to Ras Hasatan in the Sinai Desert. I think that’s my favorite place on the planet. Nataia and I stayed for five days. She got tan, and I got burned and we swam and walked in the desert mountains and gazed at the amazing stars at night and most of all, PRACTICED! Sinai is the best place in the world to practice and we had some incredible sessions on a cliff overlooking the Red Sea with the pink mountains of Saudi Arabia visible on the other side. Paradise!

My Egyptian Movie Star

One day a very attractive Egyptian man tried to join Natalia and I as we were doing our morning yoga in the Sinai Desert. He gave up after 20 minutes, but we ended up hanging out. and it turns out hes a very famous Egyptian Movie Star named Sherif Helmy.. He offered us a ride back to Cairo in his fancy car. Usually when we drive back we are stopped at numerous check points along the way and it takes like eight hours but because Sherif is a movie star and all the soldiers recognized him we breezed through every check point and made it back to Cairo in the record time of 5:30 hours.For the rest of the week I hung out with Sherif and it was so fun getting star treatment everywhere we went! We got go to the Pyramids at 4am when it was totally closed, we got to walk in to a restaurant where you always need a reservation – everyone in Cairo bends over backwards to please him! And the scary thing is, I could totally get used to that kind of treatment!

Movie Set

Sherif is making a new movie and me, Natalia and Marjory got to go onto the set and watch them filming the movie! It was so much fun! He’s such a good actor!

Magic Girls Trio

Now that Rami and Lara have left, its down to a trio – me, natalia and adama. I love trios! We are called the Magic Girls

Nile TV

We had a really fun appearance on Nile TV. Check out how much makeup they put on me! Yuk!

Entourage to Airport

Everyone came to the airport! All of the Newbian boyfriends, Dr Dave, my Movie Star boyfriend and Marjory were all there waving goodbye as we went through security. What a beautiful sight!

Plans with Said

Said El Artist wants me to come to Egypt in the summer and play three concerts with him! Yay! Marjory has a beautiful apartment with a guest room for me, so I’m all hooked up. We will play in the Citadel in Cairo, the Citadel in Alexadria and in the Cairo Opera House, ein sh’alla. I’ve never been to Cairo in the summer, I bet it’s gonna be HOT!!!!

Extending my Trip

Back in Istanbul, I realized that I have nothing scheduled for the first two weeks of April and the guy who owns the apartment in Istanbul said I could rent my room for those two weeks, so I said , why the heck not? and so now I’m staying here to practice for another two weeks! Yay! Bunyamin is excited that I’m staying and he said we can practice together every day. Yay!

Third Week of Egypt!

2009-03-22T12:27:00.005-04:00

Good Morning Egypt

We just got back from being on Good Morning Egypt. For me it was my fifth time on that show! We needed to be at the TV station at 7:45 which was not easy considering we usually go do bed at around 6!

I get a little silly when I’m overtired, and everything was striking me as funny when we were being interviewed, but I was doing alright until the moment when Rami was talking and there was a close up on his face and the biggest fly I’ve ever seen chose that moment to land right in the middle of his head. If it wasn’t for my ugai breathing techniques I would have been rolling on the floor convulsing with laughter and I was just praying that the camera would stay away from me, and thank god they didn’t show me until I regained some of my cool.

But anyway the show was great! All of us got to be in the show -- Rami, Nataia, Adama and Lara. We played Debke and Newbian and I played “Ana Fintizara” on the rababa.

Now we are back home. Everyone else has gone back to bed but I’m all hyper, so I’m working on my blog.

Ewart Hall Concert

When I was in Sinai last year I met this hot guy Ahmed who plays oud in one of the most famous bands here called “Woostel Baled”. So I was sitting with him at “Horeia” café and he offered to learn one of my songs to play with me in my big show!

So he came over that night at around 4am and we stayed up till morning playing very very very soft. It was pretty magical. Anyway he learned the “Sexy Chiftetelli” and he also played on “Ana Fintizara” and the blend between the oud and kemenche was gorgeous and we had amazing chemistry together on stage.

Said El Artist came to my show! I invited him and he said “ein sha’lla” so I didn’t really expect him, but there he was in the first row all dressed up in a suit! I was so touched! I made a little speech honoring him and he stood up and took a bow and everyone clapped. It was really touching. Then I said in English “Now I’m nervous!”

Marjory moved to Egypt just in time for my show! It was great to see her! She’s the editor of the middle eastern desk of the AP! She’ll be living in Cairo for 2 – 3 years.

Surprise for Nubians

The Nubian boyfriends complained that the song we call Newbian is not Nubian at all so to surprise them we researched Nubian rhythms and did an introduction to the piece that was really Nubian and Adama and I did this Nubian clapping pattern. You should have seen the boyfriends! They flipped out!

Alex Show

We got to spend a lovely couple of days in beautiful Alexandria. This time they put our show in a smaller theater that was the perfect size. I had a nice workshop before the show and we had a great turn out. All our Nubian boyfriends came all the way from Cairo to see the show and Jehan and Hana brought a bus full of very fashionable people from Cairo (designers and models and stuff). There are amazing cafes and restaurants and markets in Alex, so we had a great time walking all around. There is also my favorite pub in Alex – all these Egyptian men sit around and drink Stella beers and eat thermis beans and this oud player Said goes from table to tables singing Om Kolthum songs.

NileTV

Nile TV came to my apartment to interview me! It was a very cute interview and we all got to play a couple songs. The interview included the angry neighbors banging on the door cause we were making so much noise!

1am shisha business meeting on Mohamed Ali street

We had a meeting at the drum shop on Mohamed Ally street at 1 am over a shisha. They are making Raquy Riqs that are actually made in Syria! They are really good ones and I’m psyched about them!

Spice Store

The girls and I went absolutely crazy in this spice store! Now we have gifts for everyone!

We have one week left in Egypt and tonight we are off to chill and practice in one of my favorite places on the planet – the Sinai Dessert! I promise to take pictures!

First week in Egypt 2009

2009-03-13T12:07:00.005-04:00

The first week in Egypt has flown by!

This was my first time in Egypt without Rami, and I was a bit apprehensive what it would be like. But it turned out just fine!

First of all its been great for my Arabic, because when I’m with Rami, everyone addresses him because he is an Egyptian looking man. So this time I got to do all the talking, so it’s been great practice!

I found a great apartment in the same building as last year on the market street! It’s the best building – on the second floor are the Sudanese princesses where we do amazing henna parties and on the first floor is the Nubian men's club where we can play pingpong, pool and bang on our drums as loud as we want until the wee hours of the moring! Also on the corner of the street is the best juice in Cairo – the carrot juice tastes like cream!

Rami arrived after a week and its so nice to be with the big baby in Egypt again!

Our wonderful Nubian Boyfriends

We have wonderful Nubian boyfriends and they are beautiful! Conveniently there are four of them and four of us girls. They take us anywhere we want! They take us on falukas on the Nile and to ahawas to smoke shisha and drink tea. They don’t let us pay for anything (not like cheap ass American guys) and when they play pingpong and pool they don’t really try to beat us (although they always end up beating us anyway cause we suck). They have the nicest smiles and the cutest dimples and they love to drum and sing and hang out with us until 6am every night!

Jehan and Hanna

Jehan and Hana are here! They are so much fun – we've been hanging out with them and they’re planning to come to our show in Alex!

Pita incident

We were sitting in an ahawa and we ordered some food. When it came the pile of pitas fell onto the mud street and the guy just picked them up and put them on our table! I actually ate the pita anyway cause it looked like clean mud, but the girls won’t stop making fun of me for doing that.

Lara’s Toe Massage

Lara is here! She got a grant to come to Istanbul and Egypt and she will play with us in our concerts in Egypt!

I must mention that I have a certain spot on my big toe that is soooo intense and I offered Lara 20 Egyptian pounds (about four dollars) to give me a foot massage, and nobody has ever got my spot so well as Lara. At one point she got both big toe spots at the same time! I had multiple toe-gasms!

Hanging w Said El Artist

Even though it won’t work out to do a concert together, we’ve been hanging out a lot with Said. He is so sweet and as charming as ever and it’s really fun at his place – there are tons of drums and fun people. He lets us rehearse in his practice space and take over his whole place as usual. We are planning on making an album and a video together next year called “Erda and Magnun” (Monkey and Crazy) - I’m Erda (he calls me monkey cause I like to repeat back whatever he plays) and he is Magnun cause he’s nuts so he thinks that would be a catchy name for an album.

Natalia in Training

Nataia just got invited back to Columbia to play professional basketball next month so she needs to get some exercise. The problem is – where do you do that in Cairo? There is no chance of running in the streets and she’s having a hell of a time finding a basket ball court – so guess what she does? She runs up and down the stairs of our building for a half hour non stop! The neighbors are all wondering about her.

Last Two Weeks in Istanbul

2009-03-02T12:17:00.007-05:00

My Fabulous Teacher Bunyamin

About six years ago I got an album by a group called Harem which is a Turkish percussion ensemble. I remember being blown away by this music, and I got a lot of new inspiration and ideas for my own compositions. I had a fantasy that I would go to Turkey and find those guys and play with them.

After a week of studying with Binyamin, he was showing me some of his videos, and guess what? That is his band! My fantasy came true!

I’ve been practicing with Bunyamin day and night! I’m learning a whole new style!
If somebody had asked me before I came here “Is your style more Egyptian or Turkish” I would have said “half and half”. But now that I’m studying the Turkish style from the real deal, I realize that my technique was 90% Egyptian with a tiny hint of Turkish. The Turkish style takes A LOT of practice! These guys practice between five and ten hours a day! The speed is incredible. I feel like I’m starting to get it, but I need much more practice. Bunyamin says that in one year I’ll have it if I practice five hours a day. Ein Sh’alla.

Our practicing has several elements. We spend a lot of time on technique, we do some listening to Indian music (many Turkish drummsers get inspiration from Indian music) and we make recordings together since his practice studio is also a recording studio! Listening back to your own playing is a great way to see what needs to improve!

Also, Bunyamins studio seems to be the hang out for all the most amazing drummers! Hamdi Aketai, Suat, and many others hang there and I get to jam with all of them! I love the jams because I can take the new moves I’m learning and put them in context!

By the way, those of you who have heard any Tarkan albums, that’s Bunyamin playing dumbek! He has toured with Tarkan all over the world!

Aydin

I was just thinking that I would love to find a real sufi trance ceremony with whilring dervishes, and I was getting a carrot juice, and I met violinist Aydin who told me that tonight he’s playing in a ceremony and that he will give me a ride! It was a magical ceremony, and the violinist was out of this world. Since then I’m giving him yoga lessons in exchange for makam lessons (Turkish modes).

Farouk

Omar Farouk Tekbilek played a free concert in the Topkopi Palace! It was the most beautiful place for a show I’ve ever seen! We got to hang out with him after the show!

David Kucherman in Istanbul!

David Kucherman the incredible riq player from Germany came to Istanbul for our last week there. He’s thinking of moving there so he came to check out the scene. It was wonderful to have him there. He also took a lesson from Bunyamin and some Turkish clarinet lessons.

Mehmet Akatay

David told me there’s this guy in Istanbul who is perhaps the greatest riq player in the world. What he didn’t tell me was that he was sooooo cute! The guy came to our house to give David a lesson when I happened to be home and it was love at first sight! We spent the whole day together and may end up eloping and forming a riq and dumbek duet!

Off to Cairo

So we put away the Turkish dictionaries, got out our Arabic dictionaries, packed our bags and now we are in the airport waiting to fly to Egypt. We were only here a month but we made so many incredible connections! I can’t count how many times I heard “Ben Seni Seviyorum” (I love you) today from our new Turkish friends! This month in Istanbul exceeded all of my expectations (which were high to begin with). I’m so inspired!

Second Week in Istanbul

2009-02-15T08:17:00.015-05:00

It’s been two weeks now since we arrived in Istanbul and there’s been plenty of action to report!

TV appearances
Okay Temiz was going around the TV stations a couple days before the big show and he invited me to join him! On the first show I was interviewed and then I got to play a solo! On the second show me and Okay and a couple amazing drummers from Bulgaria traded fours! It was really fun!

Concert
On February 11th I got to perform my composition “Karsilama” in front of 2000 people! It was Okay Temiz’s 70th birthday concert. This was a huge sold out event, and it was such an honor that he invited us to play in it! All of the girls (me, natalia, Amanda, adama and Veronique) did a great job and the piece was very well received!

Us Backstage right before we played!

Our performance! The other musicians were on stage behind us

Close up of our performance

Us with Okay Temiz right after the show!

Lessons w Binyamin
My lessons with Binyamin are going great! I have a six hour lesson every other day and then every other day I practice. My left hand is getting the workout of its life!

Ouch!

Natalia and I have also been going to the studio every night from around 11 –3am to practice! Then we go out for French fries with sweet ketchup and carrot juice at 4am. (I love how when you’re abroad you do things you would NEVER do at home!)
I don’t think I ever played so much in my life! Binyamin’s studio seems to be a hang out for all the greatest drummers in Turkey. All these cat’s that I’ve been hearing about (Suat, Hamdi Aketai, ect) hang out there so I get to jam with everyone! Many of the drummers here have seen me play on you tube, so they come around to the studio to meet me. Everyone is extremely welcoming and nice to me here.

Binyamin plays the skin drum and puts a light in it to heat it up! It looks cool!

The Hamam (Turkish Bath House)
Somebody didn’t pay the water bill in our apartment so they shut off our water a few days ago and it won’t be back for another couple days! So we thought it was a good excuse to check out the Hamam! The Hamam is a public bath house. In the old days people didn’t have showers in their apartments – they all bathed at the hamam. It was a beautiful ritual and a nice way to connect to your community and get pampered. So we checked out a small local Hamam (not touristic at all). it’s not the most beautiful one ive ever seen, but its cheap and the guy gives a killer scrub and massage. For the massage you lay on this warm marble block and he covers you in suds and then massages you. it’s really lovely! We’ve been going to all the neighbors with big buckets and borrowing water from them. We’ve been also using the bathroom at starbucks (I’m ashamed to say I use this situation as an excuse to get soy lattes)

Jam with Emin
Emin, the famous maker of dumbeks has his shop right down the street. There’s always people jamming there. He likes me a lot (maybe cause of that naked picture of me behind an Emin dumbek that he keeps in his drawer) . But anyway its always fun to go there and jam.

Us with Emin in his store

The Quest for Misirli Ahmet Continues
Still no luck meeting Misirli Ahmet but I’m determined to at least meet him once before I leave. It’s unbelievable how much I hear his name! He’s really a legend among drummers here!

Dinner Partys
Okay Temiz came over to our house for a dinner party! We turned our ping pong table into a dinner table and made a feast. Fabio came too. We all had a fabulous time playing music, eating and drinking wine!

Our fabulous dinner party!

Also our Italian boyfriend Fabio likes to come over and cook for us. He makes a mean pasta dinner!

Fabio making vegan pasta!

Check out Adama's video blogs at myspace.com/adamadrum!

First Week in Istanbul

2009-02-06T23:06:00.009-05:00

Merhaba! It’s been almost a week since we arrived in Istanbul so I thought it was about time for a blog entry!

The apartment that we found on Craig’s list is a dream come true! It’s so comfortable and there is plenty of room for all five of us (me, Adama, Natalia, Amanda and Veronique). The kitchen is incredible and there are two bathrooms, wireless internet, central heating and all the comforts you could ask for! Natalia and I have the master bedroom with the nicest bathroom I’ve ever seen! We each have our own sink!

Galata Neighborhood

And the Galata neighborhood – a musicians fairy land! We have not left our neighborhood this whole week because everything and everybody is within a ten minute walk from our flat! All the music stores, all the music celebrities, all the great teachers and all the live music venues are a short hop away! I wouldn’t be surprised if we don’t leave this neighborhood for the whole month!

All of the streets in our neighborhood are windy and cobble stone and there are tons of cafes , grocery stores , restaurants and plenty of great musicians playing on the street. There are very steep hills in the neighborhood. By the end of the month we will all have very nice butts!

The Dumbek Chic Posse Walking Around Their Hood

Celebrities in the Neighborhood

So far anyone we hoped to meet happens to be right here in Galatta! Here are some of the celebrities we’ve been hanging with:

Okay Temiz

Okay Temiz is one of the cutest people on the planet. He is a world known percussionist who has released countelss albums, one of which is my top five favorite albums of all time – Zurnas and Darbukas. I met him after his show at Lincoln Center several years ago and we’ve kept in touch. He has an amazing atelier right around the corner from us.

The girls and I went to meet him and we performed for him a piece that we’ve been working on that’s actually inspired by a piece on his album Zurnas and Darbukas! He couldn’t believe it!

Performing for Okay Temiz

Next week is Okay’s 70th birthday and he’s giving a big rhythm concert with drummers from all over the world to celebrate and guess who he invited to perform in it…….. Us! We will play the piece called Karsilama in the second half of the show! woo hoo! He’s being very nice to us and seems to want to hang out with us every night!

Selim Sesler

Selim Sesler is one of the greatest gypsy clarinetists in the world and he plays for free right in our hood several nights a week! We’ve already seen pichim play twice. Every night we see amazing live music!

Missirli Ahmet

Missirli Ahmet has a darbuka school right on our street! They have a very specific style. They only play on the clay and skin drums. They don’t let people join in the middle of their course, but it was nice to hang out there and see the beautiful school. They are very protective about their style – they don’t let the students record, video tape or even take notes! They won’t even let us observe the classes!

Missirli Ahmet’s Brother Hikmet Checking Out My Style at the School.

My Fabulous Teacher Benjamin

I’m having the best dumbek lessons of my life! Natalia and I went to meet this drummer Binyamin who was recommended to us. We ended up staying there for five hours! He gave us so many exercises – I filled up eight pages of my notebek! I haven’t felt so pushed in a long time! It’s ALL about the left hand! I’m gonna take a lesson with him every other day and then every other day practice. Today it took me four hours just to go over everything we did in the lesson! He doesn’t speak a work of English but its okay and he sends me text messages in Turkish telling me to practice! How cute! I’m very excited about studying with him.

Hakan

The girls found a nice dumbek teacher to give them group lessons. His name is Hakan and he has a cool studio in our neighborhood.

Other Friends so Far

David

David is a sweet guy from Ohio that has been living in Istanbul for three years studying dumbek and teaching English. He’s been helping us acclimate here, taking us around, giving us advice and introducing us to good people.

Fabio

Fabio is a nutty Italian percussionist working for Okay Temiz. We hang out with him a lot. He’s really fun as long as you don’t let him drink too much Raki.

Fabio Drinking Raki

Other Interesting Odds and Ends

I’ve changed my name to Raki (pronounced Rakeu) while I’m in Turkey because people remember that easily. Raki is the Turkish alcoholic drink.
I have a piece of garlic stuck in my ear cause I was trying a natural remedy to an ear infection
We've been smoking out of a potato (don’t ask).
We go to bed every night at five am and wake up at two pm.
I made Turkish Coffee in a frying pan (I don’t recommend it – it’s disgusting)

Upcoming Shows in the Middle East

Wednesday Feb 11th. 8:00pm
Okay Temiz Birthday Concert
(212) 231 54 97-8
CRR Concert Hall
CRR - Cemal Resit Rey Konser Salonu
Darülbedai Caddesi, Harbiye
Istanbul. Turkey

Thursday March 12, 2009
Alexandria Library
Great Hall
Alexandria, Egypt

Wednesday, March 18th
Ewart Hall
Cairo, Egypt

Istanbul, Ready or Not, Here We Come!

2009-02-03T14:11:00.001-05:00

We are about to embark on a wonderful adventure! Me, Natalia, Adama ,
Amanda and Veronique will spend the next month in Istanbul!

We've already secured an amazing apartment in Galata which is the
center of the music neighborhood with all the music shops, studios and
night clubs!

We've also arranged to take lessons with Misirli Ahmet, the inventor
of the Turkish Split Hand Technique!

I got my dumbek, kemenche, poi, fake hair and all of my cutest
outfits. I plan to learn Turkish on the plane ride over with some
Turkish language books I got (it's like 12 hours so I'll be totally
fluent by the time I arrive). I already know how to say "Turk gem
choc boktan" which means "my turkish is shit" and a few other useful
phrases.

So wish us luck! If you want to be notified when a blog is bosted,
sign up on the left of the screen.

2008-03-26T16:59:00.005-04:00

Sudanese Treasures Next Door

There are four beautiful women from Sudan who live next door and I started spending lots of time at their house.

It all started when one of them knocked on my door at 2am to apologize for missing one of my shows and she saw that I was in the middle of giving myself a henna design. The next day I went over to their place and got the full henna treatment, Sudanese style!

First we drank tea in the salon and chatted. When I finished my tea they took me into one of the back bedrooms and smeared henna all over the bottoms of my feet! It felt so good! They also gave me a clump to just grab with my hand!

It takes a few hours to dry and during that time I get the royal treatment, propped up with pillows on the bed. These ladies love smoking shisha, and so while they are keeping me company, there is a constant shisha going. They also burn amazing incense, and keep bringing in coffee and tea and treats. And we have girl talk! You know, girls are really all the same, no matter where, so the conversations always end up on that universal subject – BOYS! They have some amazing henna over there – extremely dark! Oh, and they also keep bringing me presents! I’ve already gotten a bag of Sudanese henna to take home, some Sudanese perfume and a scarf from Ethiopia! By now I’m getting used the Sudanese Arabic which is a bit different from Egyptian, and I’’m having fantasies about going over there next year!

My Three Concerts

Ewart Hall – Cairo

Ewart Hall is a thousand seat concert hall in downtown Cairo, and, el humdelila, my show was packed!

It was one of the best shows I ever had. The band was so tight! And the audience was incredible - I kept on hearing stuff like “Raquy, we love you” and “Raquy Forever” coming from different parts of the audience. I had a wonderful Canun player, ustaz walel mahalawi as a special guest for my samai! He played it so beautifully! I also did something with the bones and something with spinning glow poi in the show!

We got a standing ovation at the end and then my neighbor, eight year old Mustafa came up and gave me flowers!

My friend and collegue Dr. Dave made a fine recording of the show, and I’m planning on releasing it to the public as either a cd or a dvd!

Alex Bibliotheque

The best thing about the Alex show was getting to spend the weekend in Alex! Alex is so nice! We got a hotel right on the corniche and spent hours walking around exploring the markets and ally ways!

The carrot juice in Alex is so sweet I could have sworn that they put sugar inside, but they didn’t! I also broke my veganism for a day and tried some fish – sooooooo delicious! My body was very happy!

We had a group of our friends follow us from Cairo and we all had a blast.

The show at the bibliotheque was nice but not as special as the other shows – it’s hard when your’e playing in a 1700 seat concert hall – even if a couple hundred people show up it sees sad!

Sawy on the Nile

Last night was our show at Sawy and nice outdoor stage on the Nile. My students played as the opening act. They were so cute and excited. For many of them this is the first and last time they will ever perform music on a stage, so it was a special night for everyone. They also brought all their friends and family so once again the show was packed.

Signs that I’ve been in Egypt for Quite a While

2008-03-16T20:21:00.006-04:00

On the rare occasions that I see other foreigners walking down the street I have to resist the urge to yell “You are welcome in Egypt!”

Instead of using an alarm clock I just rely on the noon call to prayer to wake me up in time for my class

I call people at 3am for no good reason.

I’m losing my "P” – even in English I’m saying things like “we can’t find a barking spot” or “I hope a lot of beoble come to my show”

I can’t walk down my street without all the vegetable vendors in the market yelling to me about artichokes (by now they all know that is my favorite vegetable)

Because I’m so covered up in public I can go for weeks without shaving or brushing my hair! I’m really starting to look like a cavewoman!

On a street that is racing with speeding traffic, I calmly strut across, knowing that Allah will divert the cars from my path.

Finally Some Fame!

By the end of last year I couldn’t walk down the street without somebody recognizing me from Television. At my favorite restaurant, The Blue Nile, I got celebrity treatment because the servers had seen me on TV. People were asking for my autograph and to have pictures taken with me wherever I went.

When I arrived this year, I was suddenly just another person! Nobody seemed to recognize me. When I walked into the Blue Nile expecting my celebrity treatment, I found that there was a group of new servers who hadn’t the foggiest idea who I was! In fact we almost got thrown out because what we ordered didn’t meet a certain minimum!

Finally last week I made some appearances on TV. I was on Good Morning Egypt for the third year in a row and immediately after we left the studio people recognized us, and ever since at least two people stop me on my walk to school to tell me that they saw me on TV. Wait till we go to the Blue Nile now!

Escape to Desert Paradise

I can’t be in Cairo for more than a month without a little vacation in the Sinai Desert.This year we decided to check out the scene at Ras Ha Satan which is a remote resort on the red sea where many great musicians from Israel and from Egypt hang out and play music together.

I got a group together including one of my students from school, Hassan, Baraka who came to visit from Greece, and two Swedish guys – Fred who is studying drumming here and Johannas who is studying Arabic.The bus picked us up at our house and took us straight to Ras Ha Satan. We arrived just in time for sunrise over the mountains of Saudi Arabia! Stunning!

The place is run by an interesting couple – Ayash who is beduin and Segal, an Israeli woman. They have two adorable little boys. The young one is named Samai!
The accommodations are simple but quite comfortable. Each person gets a bungalow. Our bungalow had an indoor room with a nice hard bed, and two outdoor areas with carpets – one like a porch right in front and one like a garage on the side. And all this is RIGHT on the beach – about ten footsteps away from the Red Sea!

There is one big communal bathroom that is impressively clean all the time with hot water. There is hardly any electricity in the entire place, but at night they light bonfires and candles all around.

There were so many good musicians there! I met oud players, guitar players, other drummers, Beduin singers one amazing woman who sang Finnish folk songs and more.
The days were spend jamming, swimming, napping eating and talking to people. Every night we jammed around the big fire. My glow poi were a big hit – I got a lot of practice in!

And the food was excellent. There is one dish that I highly recommend to vegetarians called Vegetable Matluba which is rice, tomatoes, peas, corgettes and eggplant all baked together and served in this huge pile with salad and tehina. But careful – it may take five hours from when you order it until when it arrives, so you have to plan in advance!

We had to hurry back to Cairo for another television appearance – this time on the Nile Variety Show. I thought that we would all get to play but it turns out they didn’t have enough room on the set for everyone, so it was just me and Rami. But what an appearance we made – we came straight from the beach and a seven hour bus ride. My hair looked like birds may be living inside it, we were covered in sand and smelly (but I guess smell doesn’t matter for TV). I asked to go to the makeup department but there was no time. I’m afraid to see what I looked like.

Tonight I have a meeting with Gwaret El Fan the company that makes my drums. They have this new design they want me to check out with copper on the bottom.

Tomorrow is the last official rehearsal before the dress rehearsal!

2008-03-01T22:52:00.006-05:00

Reunion with Said

Tonight we hung out with Said El Artist for the first time this year. He looked great and it was wonderful to see him. We brought him as a gift a Remo ocean drum and I think he really liked it. Within 5 minutes he figured out every possible sound you could get out of that thing!

We both talked enthusiastically about doing a big show again next year, ein shalla. We listened to his latest album which is great and then he took out a stack of incredible professional pictures taken of the rehearsals and the concert last year! My favorite was of me, Said and Osama blowing out the candles of a cake. I wish I had copies!

Midnight Poi Contest on the Streets of Cairo

We were walking around Cairo last night looking for a place where I could practice spinning my glow balls, and we turn down this ally and what do I see---- another fire spinner! I was like “what? I didn’t know that this was popular in Egypt” but when I took a closer look I saw that it was the boy from the ahawa (shisha café), spinning the coals for the nargilas! It looks just like fire spinning! So I took out my poi and we stood face to face showing each other our moves.

Mom Visit

My mom came to visit! But she arrived with horrible flu and was in bed for a week! She had to extend her trip from five days to eleven days because she was so sick to travel! So we stayed home most of the time. I tried to bring Egypt to her while she was on the couch by having many people over such as my student for the free class, my Egyptian drumming troupe for rehearsals, my rababa teacher Ustaz Fikry el Ganawy who wanted to marry her and some of our dear Nubain friends who sat around the couch teaching her the Nubian language. El humdelila towards the end of her trip she recovered and had a few nice days of being healthy in Cairo.

Concert Dates

I just found out I’m playing at the Alexandria Library on March 22nd!

And the two big Cairo show dates are set! One is March 19th in Ewart Hall which was already booked last year. Then one week later on March 25th we are playing at the Sawy Cultural Center! I decided to have the Egyptian Messengers (my class) perform as an opening act and they are all excited to be playing in a real venue, not just at school.Last week I went over to Sawy and was very pleased to be able to read and fill out the contract all in Arabic!!

Rehearsal Update

The second rehearsal was challenging. I decided to have this rehearsal at my house since my mom was still on the couch, feverous and semi- delirious. One of the guys was late and one had to leave early, so we were very rushed. And when everyone finally arrived for the rehearsal we realized that there was another funeral going on downstairs at the Nubian men’s club (there’s a funeral there like every other day) so we couldn’t play!

One of the guys had an idea to call Makan, a gorgeous performance space around the corner that kind of looks like my living room – a beautiful room that’s empty except for carpets, pillows and drums. And the vibe there is so fine from all the Zaar trance ceremonies that happen there! This venue which usually has concerts booked every night happened to be totally free for our rehearsal! Yay!

So we bundled up my mother and caravanned over to Makan where she lay down on some pillows while we rehearsed. This rehearsal was tough because I was showing them a new piece called Maracatu which is based on Brazillian style beats and there’s some tricky stuff. We worked on this one small section for like 45 minutes. So I was feeling frustrated at the end of the rehearsal.

But then I worked with some of the guys individually, so the third rehearsal was great! We ran Maksum Madness, Maracatu and Newbian all through straight without stopping! And those are the three toughest pieces! I have Mustafa Abbas playing a bass drum with his foot, a simbati on his lap and a crash cymbal, kind of like what Fishky does!

What to Wear?

My guys here made it clear to me that they will wear neither a skirt with no shirt and makeup nor a loin cloth on stage, so that leaves me wondering, what should I have them wear for the shows? Any ideas?

My Wonderful Troupe!

2008-02-12T18:50:00.000-05:00

I've found my guys here! Yay!

They ROCK! This is going to be such an amazing show! I have one kick ass ric guy, Hane, Mustafa Abbas on dahulla, bass drum and cymbal, Medhat and Bahe on simbati and of course Rami on riq, dof and tabla. Today we met and I started showing them Newbian and Maracatu. It’s different stuff for them, but they all get it, and it sounded soooo great after just the first meeting!

These guys are on time, they dress nice, they don’t ask to smoke cigarettes in the house, and best of all they don’t mind this pink lady telling them what to play! Oh, and did I mention, they are all hot?

The first official rehearsal will be on Saturday. I can’t wait.

I’m composing a new piece which I think is going to be the big hit of the concert. It’s called “Maksum Madness” and for this piece we will all play tabla in unison. The piece is crazy! I think I’ll save it till the end of the show.

My Class

We got upgraded to a bigger classroom because so many people signed up for my class. Now I’m up to 26 students! I think the word is spreading that they can get college credit for playing tabla!

I’m still in the stage of trying to tame them. Put 26 Egyptians in a boomy room and give them all drums, and good luck trying to run a class! But it’s getting better every day – there is less tapping going on while I’m trying to talk, ect.

I’ve started talking about chakras, channeling and meditation. I even started giving them one yoga posture a day. It does help your drumming to meditate and do yoga, so as far as I’m concerned it’s all related. I get some strange looks, but for the most part, they are interested.

Strange goings on in the hood

For the last couple days I’ve been seeing some strange things below my balcony.

Yesterday I went downstairs and it looked like someone had spilled an entire bucket of red paint on the tiles in front of one of the stores.

When I looked inside and saw a bunch of men chopping at some flesh on the floor inside, I understood. This was no paint, but BLOOD! It turns out that minutes before I came down the stairs, they had sacrificed some animal right there!

An hour later when I returned there was barely a trace of the violent act.

I woke up in the middle of the night last night barely able to breathe because of the strong smell of meat cooking (and it smelled fresh!) that penetrated my bedroom!

Then today I could barely get out into the street because of piles of fruit in front of the building! And they were bringing in huge speakers! When night fell, I noticed that they had strung colorful lights all over the street. They started blasting music from the speakers, and they set up chairs across from the fruit stand. Families came and sat down to listen to the music and smoke shisha. It was a hafla, right there in the middle of the street in front of my building!

I asked the baker what’s going on and he explained everything to me. All the above weirdness – the sacrifice, the lights, the music, the fruit – was in honor of a new fruit stand. This was the opening night, so the owners threw this party in order to get attention. And I imagine the sacrifice the night before was to bless the place.

Helllo Again, You Dusty City!

2008-02-09T16:03:00.002-05:00

Apartment

In a neighborhood near downtown Cairo is the massive tomb of Saad Zaghlool. Next to the tomb is a lively street with an outdoor market of vegetables, meat, clothes, textiles and household goods. On the market street in between a shawarma joint and a 24 hour bakery there are some stairs going up into an alley. The alley is lined with more vendors, and across from the fish stall there is a door. Inside the door and up the stairs above the Nubian men’s club there is an incredible newly renovated “super lux” three bedroom apartment. This apartment is home for the next two months.

Sometimes when you rent a flat for a couple months in Cairo the apartment is full of dingy old furniture. What I love about this apartment is that it is freshly painted and relatively empty, with a minimal amount of tasteful furniture. Plus there are stained glass windows in every room! Small lights scattered about give the impression of candles. What a classy pad!

And in case of boredom, all you have to do is look out of the window down to the market. About every half hour some screaming argument breaks out right below the balcony. There are certain characters who seem to be involved in every brawl.

I feel very happy, inspired and creative in this apartment. I stay up until 5am decorating fresh dumbek heads with colored markers at the dining room table, studying Arabic, composing and planning the shows. And I’ve turned one of the extra bedrooms into a meditation room!

My walk to school every day is only ten minutes, and I get to pass my favorite juice guys. Also near my house is the beautiful music venue called Makan that houses the women’s zaar trance ceremony. I inquired today to see if I could have the free class there, and am waiting to hear back.

My Class

Once again I have a nice class. This year, there are many more girls than before, a group of six Egyptian girls who sit together in the back and giggle. Only a few of the students have dumbeks, but I’m hoping they will all have one by the end of the week. THANK GOD my class this year is at 1:30 and not 9:30 like last year. Even so, with jetlag and all, I can barely drag my butt out of bed in time.

My Egypt Health Balance

On the one hand I’m drinking fresh juices all day long, and eating almost all raw delicious fruits and veggis. On the other hand the air is dusty and polluted, I smoke all kinds of stuff here, and going jogging in Cairo would be ridiculous and counterproductive, so I figure it balances out.
We did bring pet scoby with us and chef Rami has begun the brewing process for the historic first batch of kambucha in Egypt.

And for you raw foods people, how about this – sprouted foul! I’m serious! It’s good!

Auditions for My Own Egyptian Troupe!

I’m VERY excited because I’ve started assembling my new Egyptian drumming troupe!
As soon as I landed I started spreading the word that I’m looking for some young bright drummers and who can play stuff that’s not only Egyptian. Today I had two meetings from guys who were recommended to me, and they are both GREAT! The first guy, Mustafa Abbes, was wearing these fancy pointy shoes and picked up everything so fast! I had him play a challenging series of maksum variations and then I showed him my new samai with that part in 14 (3+4+4+3) and he got that as well! So this guy was on time to the meeting, he didn’t ask to smoke cigarettes in my apartment, he said he was on a diet, and he could play in 14. I was like, “Mustafa, are you sure you’re Egyptian?”

The second guy Baha was also great and picked up everything. And he was sooooo enthusiastic and excited!

Oh and did I mention, they are both hot? I even started imagining how I’m gonna dress them up for the show!

Pretty sweet! After meeting those two, I have a feeling this is going to be a kick ass show and I’m really getting psyched!

The first rehearsal will be at Mustafa’s studio next Tuesday.

Jet Lag

Jet lag is hilarious! I’m up every night being enormously productive at least until the morning prayer around 5am or so. Last night I ate an enormous meal at 2:30am. Today I woke up just in time for my afternoon class with a craving to smoke. I’ll probably adjust somewhat, but in the meantime I’m enjoying being on this crazy schedule!

Last Blog of Egypt Trip 2007

2007-03-28T09:06:00.000-04:00

Egypt Tour

All the concerts went really well. We didn’t have one show that wasn’t packed and everyone was very excited! I posted footage from some of the shows on You Tube so you can check them out:

Mageneen Part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LnFM4sYPN8w
Mageneen Part 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YL6x7KQOt9M
And here's a clip from me and Fikry at the Cairo Jazz Club:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VPK1x256dug

Here are some photos from them!

Alexandria

The Messengers backstage in Alex!

Minia

Drum and Dance Jam after the Concert!

University Student Recital

They did GREAT!

Television

Altogether I’ve been on TV about 8 times so far this trip. Two TV stations showed up to the student show! One of them was the 8:00 news and we watched it the next day!

Other Media

So far there are three newspaper articles out about me and one beautifully done magazine article.

Today I was sitting on the beach in Sinai (yes, again) and the waiter came up to me and showed me another article in the paper about some American girl in Cairo named Raquia Stevens, 28 years old, who plays tabla and rababa and teaches tabla at the University! The article said that after work she goes to play with her Egyptian band. I wonder why I haven’t met her yet we seem to be doing very similar things!

Our show at the Cairo Jazz Club got rave reviews on Nile FM radio station!

My University class is over! Teaching it was such an enjoyable experience, and a number of the students are truly inspired – they plan on forming a drumming band together!

The other news is that I bought 37 beautiful raquy dumbeks – a bunch of 4 peg, several 6 peg and four simbati’s (big ones). Let’s just hope the shipment arrives soon!

We had one last fling in the Sinai desert (this time five days) for INTENSE practicing. That’s all we did besides swim and eat. I’m actually sunburnt on my wrists from practicing in the sun so much! I came up with this gorgeous new roll that sounds like waves crashing!

So now we have three days left in Cairo to wrap everything up and I’ll be back to New York this weekend! Soy Latte, here I come!

Concert in Ewert Hall

2007-03-13T10:32:00.000-04:00

My wish came true. We PACKED Ewert Hall – a THOUSAND SEAT HALL!
El Humdelila!

The crowd was amazing. They were cheering the whole time. They adored Said, went crazy for Osama and were very excited about me and the Messengers. They also went wild for Pete’s beatboxing! Pete got to do a duet with Said playing on his mouth at the end of the show. It was amazing.

After all the stress of organizing this concert (and believe me it was VERY stressful at times) I enjoyed myself so much on stage with Said! I was completely relaxed and appreciating the moment!

The messengers did a great job. There was also a dumbek clown who did silly things with the dumbek, and an older man named Arabi Hannun who, it turns out, was Said’s first teacher! The sound was very powerful with thirty drummers.

Said’s Troupe and Messengers waiting for Sound Check

The funny thing is that Said and I both had really bad colds on the day of the show, but during the show we were both fine!

Restoration in the Sinai Desert

We all worked so hard for the concert that we all needed a vacation afterwards, so I rented a private bus for the morning after the concert and the Messengers plus a couple of my university students went to the Sinai Desert for four days! Ahhhhh! That was the closest thing to being in Paradise that I’ve experienced.

We were on the Red Sea in a gorgeous hotel on the beach. The place was totally deserted so we took over the entire beach! We went snorkeling, swam, ate, drank, smoked and mostly PRACTICED! The Sinai desert is the most inspiring place to practice! We all played hours and hours every day!

Every night after sunset the guys from the hotel would make us a bonfire and we would all drum until we went to sleep. It was very hard to leave there last night!

From left to right – Ava, Veronique, Britney, Lex, Vlado, Beat List, Moi, Marjory, Rami, Dominic.

Rami got the Red Sea all to himself!

Egypt Tour this week!

Tonight we are playing at the Cairo Jazz Club. Wednesday we’re playing in Alexandria and Friday in El Minia! We’re traveling everywhere by train. Egyptian trains are really nice and comfortable.

Egyptian Saturday Night Live!

Rami and I were on the Egyptian version of Saturday Night Live! It’s called “Leila Kebira”. Actually we had no idea what it was going to be. We were just told that we would be on Dubai Television.
We came straight from dress rehearsal with Said so I looked really shabby. I wasn’t dressed up at all.
We arrived at the station and the lady from the show looked at me and said, “You’re not going to wear THAT, are you”? so she sent me over to “Hair” and “Makeup”. After spending some time there, I looked like one of those announcers on MTV.

Makeup – YUK!

Then they said “you're on” and we were led into this room full of screaming young people. The set looked just like Saturday Night Live. There was a handsome young movie star type who was the host sitting at a desk and the back drop was the Dubai sky line and there was an awesome band there with a fantastic nai player.

Whenever I’m on TV, there's an issue with how I sit, because I can’t sit on a normal chair and play! But when they are interviewing me it’s good if we are all on the same level, so everybody ends up sitting on the floor! It was hilarious when this fancy host came out behind his desk and joined us on the floor!

So that was my third TV appearance so far this trip, and now Rami and I can’t walk down one block without people recognizing us! Even in the Sinai Desert people were recognizing me from TV!

Upcoming Tour!

Next on the agenda – Tour of Egypt with Raquy and the Messengers – Cairo, Alex and Minia! Stay tuned!

March 4: Egypt Concert Tour!

2007-03-07T23:55:00.000-05:00

So it looks like we will have at least five shows in Egypt!
Here’s the schedule so far:

March 1 – March 6th rehearsals with Said
March 7th Concert with Saiid
March 8th 12th Go to Sinai Desert to practice for remainder shows
March 12th show at the Cairo Jazz Club
March 14th show in Alexandria
March 16th show in Minia
March 20th student recital at the university
End of March – possible show at festival near Aswan

Rehearsals with Saiid

Saiid’s troupe is bigger than ever! He has like 20 guys this time! You should hear it when they all come in for Nubian!

There’s one piece that Saiid and Osama and I are playing the solo part. I must admit, playing that piece with the two of them and the whole troupe is one of the funnest things I’ve ever done!

I was nervous about having the Messengers play for Saiid, because he is very picky! The messengers that are here so far are Marjorie, Veronique, Ava (from LA), Pete List and Dominic (from Canada). They worked so hard learning Yimkis Asess! We rented a falouka on the Nile for 2 hours and practiced a lot. Anyway, we played the piece for Said and he LOVED it! And get this – in the solo part, I’m having his whole troupe come in and hold Maksum for the Messengers!

He’s making all the guys wear suits with pink ties. I’m glad about the ties because they match my outfit!

Television Appearances

So far I had an interview and played on Nile Satellite TV, and Rami and I made an appearance on Good Morning Egypt. Later that day, everywhere I went people recognized me! The interview was ALL in Arabic. I did ok with the first several questions, but when they got a little more philosophical, like, “what’s the difference between pop music and your music” and stuff like that, I started sounding like an idiot. When it got to the point that I started speaking Hebrew by mistake, they said, “you know what, why don’t you just play another song” so thank god we just played another piece and that was the end of it.

Tomorrow some people from Dubai television are coming to the dress rehearsal to pick us up for another thing, and they also want to do an article about me in Egypt Today.

My Mother in Egypt!

My mother was cold in New York so she came to Egypt to visit me for the first time!

My mother’s first rababa lesson

She was only here for a week, but we managed to do lots of stuff.

Feb 15: Dumbek Fever Sweeps Cairo

2007-02-16T15:07:00.000-05:00

I thought people and New York had dumbek fever! But I’ve never seen such dumbek fever as I’m witnessing here in Cairo!

Me and Natalia Perlaza Junior. Hey, who’s that on my drum head?

My class at the University keeps getting bigger and bigger. Every day more people ask me if they can come sit in even though they’re not registered!

My students adorable, and they are so into the dumbek! They stay after class to practice. I can’t get them to leave! One of my students came up to me after the class today and said, “Thanks so much, Ya Doktor! Most people come to University with books, but we get to come to University with tablas!”

The free class is getting bigger too. The first week I had 2 people, the second week I had about 10 people and a bunch of people I don’t know called to ask about the class next week! Every week I need to find a bigger place to hold it! Because of this, it has the quality of some kind of clandestine meeting – I don’t reveal the location of the class until the last minute!

I also have a private dumbek student and a kemenche student as well!

2nd Free Class – Downtown Cairo at Nader’s apartment.

I must say, I love the structure of having a class four mornings a weeks! I have a 20 minute walk through a lovely area of Cairo, past some beautiful mosques, parks, markets, etc. The people I meet on the way know me by now and they all say hi to me. Every day I stop at the juice place and have an orange juice on the way to school. Then I have a carrot juice at the same place on the way back. I get home with a carrot mustache on my face and Rami makes breakfast while I edit my book in the sun on the balcony. After breakfast I go back to bed.

I had a meeting with some people from TV stations yesterday. They are planning to cover the show and do some interviews beforehand.

Tonight we went to a concert of Bedouin music on an outdoor stage on the Nile. The percussion section was hilarious. It was a dumbek player, one guy playing a rusty gas tank and another guy who had an Israeli army artillery box with Hebrew on it and was playing on it with drum sticks! The gas tank sounded amazing! It has a great bass sound and the artillery box was almost like a riq!

The three of them reminded me of me, Rami and Carmine at the Figaro!

Feb 9th: Fish Offering, Concert Planning and New Dumbek Design!

2007-02-12T09:13:00.000-05:00

Meeting with Said!

We went to Said’s yesterday and had a meeting about our concert!

Rami, Dominique (the guy studying tabla from Canada) and I got to his place at midnight and he wasn’t there yet, so we got to practice really loud in his practice studio for a couple hours before he arrived.

Saiid made up for being so late by bringing us about 30 medium sized grilled fish wrapped in paper. This is like at 2:00am! He put all 30 fish on top of the wrapping on the table and left the room. All for just the three of us! There was nothing else in the meal but the fish and some pita. Not even any silverware! It was a bit overwhelming, but they were delicious (I even tasted a little!).

After the meal we went up to the “office” and talked about our plan for the show. I won’t give it away, but it’s going to be amazing.

I told him about my students who are coming and he said that he needs to hear each of them play before he allows them to perform in the concert!

He told us that Orbit TV has been rerunning footage from our last show again and again for the past two years, and that the show created a huge buzz!

I haven’t hung out with Said in two years and the difference in my Arabic skills is noticeable! We had much better communication – I could understand almost everything he said, and I could express most of what I wanted to say. I still have lots of work to do with the language, but it was satisfying to see that all the studying is paying off and that I don’t feel like such an idiot as I did last time.

New Raquy Dumbek by Gwaret Al Fan

We met with Nasser from Gwaret al Fan and he’s all excited about a new idea for a Raquy Dumbek made out of wood and silver!

I love the regular mother of pearl ones that he’s been making for me, but I’m open to new ideas, so he’s getting a couple ready for me to see and then I’ll decide if I like it or not. His idea is that if I like it, we will make the show in Cairo the “coming out” party for the new designer drum. He’s already made a bunch of the new Raquy drum heads – and they look amazing! Soon hundreds of people will be hitting my picture!

Yom Agaza ( day off) !

The view from my balcony!

Today was my first day off from school! What a luxury! I slept till 2:00pm, went down to the outdoor ahawa on my street and read my book! Then we came back home and Rami made a delicious lunch of salad, cauliflower, green beans and rice! YUM! The veggis here are so delicious it’s hard to believe they’re real! All we have scheduled today is a lesson with Fikry my rababa teacher at night.

My University Class

My class is going great! It totally filled up! They called me from the department yesterday to ask if I would accept a 16th student even though the limit is fifteen students, so I said “Yalla – why not?” I got through the first week of school smoothly. The class is so fun – it goes by so fast everyday!

I had everyone buy a copy of “Dumbek Fever” as the textbook for the class!

The first quiz is gonna be the Time Exercise next week. Everyone will have to do the Time Exercise up to four and then go back down to one next Thursday, and I will grade them on it. Hee hee.

It’s gonna take me a while to get used to them calling me “Ya Doktor”! Every time they call me that I look behind me to see who they’re talking to!

Guess what? In the University in Egypt the janitor will make you coffee! Yesterday I was so tired when I got to class, so I got the janitor and said, “Mahmood – would you please make me a double coffee?” and he brought it to me in the class! Sweet!

Back in Egypt

2007-02-07T21:49:00.000-05:00

Here I am back in Egypt! It’s really starting to feel like a second home!

Apartment!

This time we found an apartment right away. It took about 20 minutes! Our Boab from last year hooked us up and took us to this place in Moonira. It’s HUGE – our friends call it “The Palace”. It has sequinned gilded elephants all over the place and an amazing balcony overlooking a very unique old building. The bedroom has this awesome 70’s decor with furniture that looks like an old automobile! The neighborhood is wonderful. The entire street corner on both sides is an outdoor shisha café that makes great coffee and there is a sook (market) right around the corner with fresh produce.

The place is a fifteen minute walk to the University, which brings me to my next subject:

My University Class!

I can’t believe it's actually happening! I have about 12 students enrolled in the class. Most of them are Egyptian and there are two girls from the states on a semester abroad. Not all of them have drums yet, but conveniently there are little tables attached to the chairs, so the ones without drums are banging on the tables! There’s a great vibe in the class, everyone is enjoying it very much, and there are several that are showing signs of serious dumbek fever! I’m thinking of giving them a “Pop” quiz! Ha ha, get it? “Pop” quiz?

The biggest challenge for me with this class is the time. It meets four times a week at 9:30am!!!!! That means that I have to get up at 8:30am!!!!! I really don’t want this to cramp my nightlife in Cairo, so here’s what I’ve been doing:

Go to bed at 4am
Get up at 8:30am
Teach my class
Go back to bed at noon
Sleep until 3 or 4pm

It’s a little weird, but it’s working so far.

Free Class in Cairo!

Remember how I usually give a free class on Mondays in New York? Well I thought, why not in Cairo!

There are two guys here, one from Canada and one from Prague, who have basically dropped everything else in their lives in order to come to Egypt and study the dumbek. So they came over on Monday and we had a free class! And I will do it every Monday – I’m just looking for a bigger place to have it!

Fikry, Said and Halim El Dabah

So far I’ve seen these three. We went to Fikry’s folkloric orchestra rehearsal, and I got to jam with them a little and hang out with him. I’m going over to his house tomorrow for a lesson.
We got to hang out with Said a bit before a show he was having. He was better dressed than ever! It was great to see him and we’ll go over to his place later tonight.

Also my buddy, the 85 year old Egyptian composer Halim El Dabah who lives in Ohio was giving a lecture in the classroom next to mine after my class, so I surprised him and we jammed, him on the piano and me on the dumbek for the assembly.

Our First Show in Cairo

Last night it was the birthday of this guy Hisham who is a huge fan of my music, so his friend Nader organized a house concert in a beautiful apartment in downtown Cairo. It was weird for me to have all these people there that I’ve never met before who listen to my music all the time, and were actually requesting specific songs!

All in all, I’ve been seeing some incredible inspiring music shows, eating lots of tomatoes and artichokes, smoking shisha, practicing my Arabic and enjoying the sunshine. It’s good to be back.

Saiidi Concert: The Messengers in Upper Egypt

2006-03-11T16:26:00.000-05:00

We just got back from an amazing trip to Minia otherwise know as ‘The Jewel of the South’ ! Minia is a pleasant three hour train ride from Cairo, one of the first cities in ‘Upper Egypt”.

For some, reason, the government is freaked out by having foreigners in Minia. When we arrived, all the transit workers were saying stuff like “six Americans have arrived” into their walky talkies– we were the buzz of the station.

A van was waiting for us as well as a car of armed guards who followed behind for our protection. They took us straight to the Jesuit Compound, a walled compound heavily guarded.

The compound was wonderful. They gave us cozy rooms with beautiful balconies right above the theater where we were supposed to perform and fed us amazing meals in the restaurant downstairs.

After dinner we wanted to go for a little stroll on the Cornish. The gates were locked so we told the security guards we wanted to go for a little walk. Wow! What an ordeal!

Everyone got on their walkie talkies and it took a half hour to organize everyone until they let us walk outside. With us were two plain clothed security guards leading us, a couple armed guards behind us and a truck full of soldiers crawling beside us! Everything that we did, they reported into the walky talkies – stuff like, “ok, now they’re crossing the street. Now they stopped to pet a cat. Now they’re looking for a place to have shisha”. When we stopped for tea we also ordered drinks for the eight people guarding us. By the end of the walk, we were quite friendly with all the guards – they were very nice guys.

Whenever we asked them why they needed to guard us so heavily they just shrugged and explained that they are being very careful because not many foreigners come to Minia and they just want to make sure nobody kidnaps us or anything.

The next morning they took us out on a boat on the Nile. It was a old boat and it was a windy day, so in the middle of the boat trip the sail broke and the boat almost overturned! We all rolled around the boat frantically clutching our drums!

But we had nothing to worry about because the speed boat of security guards that was following us came right to the rescue and pushed us to shore. You see, there are advantages on being guarded wherever you go!

Rami, Raquy, our host Joseph and Security Guards on the Nile!

The concert was the best one yet. The place was packed with people, and what an audience!!! They were clapping, yelling and singing along for the whole show!

I saved the new song , “Do Saidi” for last and called up one of the guards, “Akram”, who’s also a great drummer, to play with us. The energy was amazing!

Now we’re back in Cairo – it’s nice to be able to walk around freely! But I’ll never forget the special concert in Minia, and I have a feeling I’ll be back there next year!

Show at Sawy!

2006-03-07T17:46:00.000-05:00

Yesterday was our show at Sawy! There was a medium sized crowd that was very excited and enthusiastic. Some of the crowd was there because they had seen us on Good Morning Egypt!

I started with my unaccompanied solo, then Rami and I did some duets, then we did some pieces with the girls, and as a finale I called up Henkish to play a drum solo with us. We ended the show with everyone playing together and the whole audience singing along to Salamat, Reni Li Shwoye Shwoye, and as an encore, Ana Fintizara! There were some television stations that came to film the show and interview us afterwards.

Smoke Machine!

Dueling with Henkish

Raquy, Henkish and the Messengers!

El B’nat – Amy, Fatima, Natalia, Christian, Maria, Raquy, Andrea, Bashira!

Happy Baby!

This morning we gave a lecture/ demonstration on Middle Eastern drumming at the American University in Cairo.

This evening I had a rababa lesson and my teacher said, “if you’re going to Minia, you have to play this piece – they’re gonna flip out” and he taught me a great Saiidi song that I’ll play in the concert in Minia!

Tomorrow night is our show at the American University! Stay tuned!

Good Morning Egypt!

2006-03-06T10:37:00.000-05:00

Yesterday the girls arrived! Natalia got nice introduction to Egypt. Shortly after her arrival, our Boab knocked on our door and told us that he was having a party in his apartment and that they would love us to play for them. So we went upstairs to a small room on the roof with about fifteen people stuffed inside and played a few songs. On the Egyptian songs they all sang along – it was very sweet.

Then we had to go to the old market area to approve the new Raquy and the Cavemen galabias! They are gorgeous! “Raquy and the Cavemen” and a picture of a tabla are stitched into the back in gold thread!

Afterwards we saw the huge crowds of people in the market and thought to ourselves, “this would be a good place to promote our show” so we took out the drums and started playing Nubian. while Rami’s cousin Karime handed out fliers for the show. About half way into the song the police had to come to disperse the crowd of people that had gathered around to see us play!

The next morning we had to wake up very early to go play on Sabah al Khir, Ya Missr! (Good Morning, Egypt). It was a little nervewracking to be filmed, knowing that it was being screened LIVE both on channel 1 Egypt and on satellite TV!

Morning Talk Show, Good Morning Egypt (Sabah al Khiir, Ya Missr)!

But it went very well. We started out playing the Nubian, then we were interviewed, then we played Farid Al Atrash then Dust. We had the whole camera crew dancing! There was a simultaneous interpreter available throughout the interview, but I actually spoke in Arabic the whole time!

When we arrived back to our neighborhood, our friends were very excited that they had just seen us on TV!

For the rest of the day were entertaining people in our apartment. It’s amazing in this country how we can have people coming over all day without actually inviting anyone! Among the people over were:

A beautiful woman named Fatima from Hungary who’s a dumbek player! We picked her up on the street while we were handing out fliers.
Osama’s mother and brother who came from Damanhoor to visit and brought a box full of sweets that I could barely lift.
Marjory came to rehearse for the show.
Haytham (my Arabic teacher)’s brother who’s an actor and friend who we played for and are now trying to get us on another TV show.
Ustaz Henkish came over to rehearse with us and brought some guy named Christian from Hungary.
In the middle of the rehearsal a group of furious neighbors, the boab and the landlord came by to have a big argument about the noise.
We had a late night visit from the Andrea, Amy and Mariah!

Tonight we have a rehearsal on a falooka for our concert at Sawy which is tomorrow!

Saiidi Street Wedding!

2006-03-01T16:10:00.000-05:00

Ok –now this night was something I’ll never forget. My Rababa teacher’s cousin was marrying one of his other cousins and he invited us to the wedding. It was in a neighborhood called “Ataba” which is a lot different from “Garden City”,the ritzy neighborhood we live in.

We got out of the cab and Fikry was there, decked out in his traditional Saiidi outfit, complete with cane and all. It was great to see him in his “hood”. He is like the king there. As we walked towards the wedding he proudly pointed out all the things he loved about his neighborhood – his house, his neighbors and the beautiful sook (market) that we walked through.

The wedding party was outdoors on an unpaved street with a stage. There were lights everywhere, a sound system, and everything on the stage was simultaneously showed on tv screens farther from the stage. As we approached, we heard on the loud speaker “welcome fikry wl ganawy and his friends from America” and we saw ourselves on tv.

We were seated at a table with the ‘creme de la creme’ of the wedding. Most of the guests were musicians, and all the celebrities who arrived were ushered straight to our table. They kept bringing out these plates of kababs and on the trays were coals covered in meat fat so that it would make lots of meaty smoke. And these guys were partying! I don’t think I’ve been hanging out with people getting so wasted since I was in college.

Periodically groups of curious kids would gather around to shake our hands only to be shooed away by the adults. The kids had a game of sneaking up and stealing kababs from the adult’s table. When this happened the adults pretended to be outraged, but as soon as the kids disappeared they would laugh.

The band was amazing, especially the percussion section – two dafs (frame drums) a muzzhar, and a few tablas – extremely coordinated and tight. Certain of the celebrity guests were invited up to sing. There were also two AMAZING belly dancers on stage.

The women were all in a different section than the men and at one point Fikry brought me over to dance with the bride. That was really fun! Those girls were getting down!

Later on, he brought me to the stage and announced that I would play one drum solo and one song on the rababa! They handed me horrible out of tune tabla and set me up with a mic. I looked at the other drummers and said, ”Yimsik Asess” (hold me the rhythm) and they did an amazing job of accompanying me on my drum solo. They got all my cues – it was as if we had rehearsed!

The funnest part was playing “Wahiishni Rod Aleya” on the rababa! The full band accompanied me and everyone in the crowd was singing along! What a thrill! Fikry just stood there and beamed the whole time. He didn’t want to play along because he wanted everyone to hear that I could play it by myself.

That may just have been the best party I’ve ever attended!

The other news is that we’re going to be on a TV show called “Sabah Al Khiir, Missr” (Good Morning, Egypt) a day before our concert at Sawy in order to advertise it!

Poster is Cairo! They white-ed out my belly from the picture!

Also we found a huge four bedroom luxury apartment on the Nile for the girls (Andrea, Maria, Bashira, Amy, Marjory and Natalia), who are all arriving in the upcoming days.

Escape to Sinai – Feb 23 - 26!

2006-02-27T18:37:00.000-05:00

The plan was to take the hellish bus all the way back to Cairo, but right after we crossed the border it was a gorgeous day and the Red Sea was looking mighty blue, so Rami and I looked at each other and said,”let’s go to Sinai for a few days!” We jumped in a local cab and went to Tarabin, a remote beach resort on the Red Sea.

WOW! Where to I start? First of all, because of the terrorism scare, this place that is usually teeming with Israeli vacationers was EMPTY! Bad for the local workers but nice for us! We went to the Nikhil Inn on the end of the strip and got an upstairs room with a balcony right over the beach. This place has a staff that is gracious and hard working by day and at night they turn into incredible dancers and drummers. As a matter of fact all along the beach in the shops we found wonderful tabla players that we jammed with!

After a day or two of being there, we didn’t feel anymore that we were on vacation. Word spread fast about who we were (and half of the people recognized us from TV) and we could not walk down the strip with out the store people begging us to drum or for me to play “reni li shwoye shwoye” and other Egyptian favorites on the kemenche.

Typical Scene on our way to lunch:
We are walking down the beach on our way to have lunch at our favorite restaurant.

Carpet Guys: Hey where were you last night? You promised you would come to the shop and play and we invited all our friends and you didn’t show up! Everyone was waiting for you!!!!

Us: Sorry – the guys at our hotel made us play all night – the chef Mohammed is a drummer and wanted to jam with us – we couldn’t leave!

Carpet Guys- Ok – so play now.

Us: We’re on our way to lunch – we’ll stop by later.

Carpet Guys – When?

Us – We don’t know exactly – we’re supposed to be on vacation.

Carpet Guys – Alright then, at 9

Us – We’ll try

Carpet Guys- You promise?

Us – Ein Sh’alla.

At one time we actually triple booked! We told our hotel staff, the carpet guys and they Beduin bracelet girls that we would come by and play, all on the same night! It got to be uncomfortable towards the third day – we had to sneak down the beach in the dark wearing disguises, hoping to make it to our room without being asked to perform!

But it was really one of the closes places to paradise that I can imagine. And the great news is:

SPRING DUMBEK RETREAT 2007 IN SINAI!

I’ve arranged everything with the hotel to have a week long retreat at the Nikhil Inn, Tarabine, Sinai! It will be in March or April – stay tuned for more details. With special guest Fikry (my rababa teacher).

The bus ride back to Cairo was hellish. Rami and I were so bored that we started imitating everyone we know and the other person has to guess who it is. If you’re reading this blog, chances are that we imitated you.

Now we’re back in our Cairo flat, and tomorrow morning will start the next task – getting people to come to our upcoming shows!

Cavemen in Tel Aviv! Feb 16 - 23

2006-02-27T11:02:00.000-05:00

The bus ride from Cairo to Tel Aviv and back was a nightmare, but I don’t feel like going into detail.

Tel Aviv is one of my favorite places. We spent a wonderful week visiting friends, eating hummus, sitting in café’s, walking on the beach and shopping on Shenkin Street. It’s so clean and easy to walk around compared to Cairo!

Cavemen in Tel Aviv!

One of the college radio stations did a whole program on Raquy and the Cavemen and we played live on the air and were interviewed. Rami actually spoke in Hebrew on Israeli radio!

It seemed like everyone was in Tel Aviv– Daphna, Raquy and Basya!

We were a little nervous about the show because it happened to be scheduled on the same evening that this TV talent show had the finals, and, believe it or not, several people said they couldn’t make it to the show because of this stupid TV show!

Sound Check at “Cultura”, Tel Aviv

But it turned out to be a wonderful show. We had a great crowd (half of which was the Buchbut family) and they loved the show. We had everyone dancing and whooping and begging for more when we finished – we could not have asked for a nicer audience. And since Mr. Yo couldn’t make is because of his visa, Fishky’s brother Ofer played the bass line on a baritone sax! It was amazing!

Women’s Zaar Ceremony!

2006-02-17T07:44:00.000-05:00

Today since we had our concerts all organized, we took it easy, and it as actually our funnest day so far! We had lessons – Rami with Ashraf on the Riq and me with Fikry on the Rababa. The lessons were schedules 2.5 hours apart, but one came late and the other early, so they ended up getting here at around the same time (that always seems to happen!) But it was ok – I got to chat with Fikry while Rami was having his lesson. It’s nice because this year my Arabic is so much better so I can really communicate with Fikry. He explained to me that when he was a kid, people only played the rababa as a drone for singing and that he was one of the first people to play actual songs on the rababa! He is AMAZING! In this lesson we worked on Taksim (improvisation based on the maqams). I learned SO MUCH! He wants me to play with him at a family wedding – one of his cousins is marrying another one of his cousins. I think it will be a blast and he said I could bring the girls as well!

After the lessons we went to meet with Henkish. I decided that rather than have a joint concert like I did with Saiid, I’d rather do my own concert and then have him as a special guest for a song or two at the end. So he’s fine with that, and we’re all excited about the show. We’ll rehearse a few times after I return from Tel Aviv.

On our way back from Henkish we had a nice surprise! Right next to the Kings Tomb on our street, we saw, on the sidewalk, about 4 dumbek and 4 frame drums made of skin, being heated up next to a burner. There was a guy there so we asked him what’s going on and it turns out there was a womans zaar ceremony just starting! We went in and saw the whole thing. It was AMAZING! The Zar is a healing ritual performed mailnly by women for women. It is an ancient purification rite that aims to pacify numerous spirits. The participants are meant to reach an altered state of consciousness. The ritual is lead by a woman called Kudeyit, who usually possesses a remarkably strong character. The Kudeyit in the ceremony we saw was like out of a dream – Rami and I both felt that we knew her before.

This ritual is one of the few acceptable ways for women to release pent up emotions and frustrations while consciously seeking healing powers.

This ceremony was very powerful and interesting. I don’t know if I reached an altered state of consciousness (or maybe I’m just always in an altered state of consciousness). Anyway, if anyone every has the opportunity to see such a thing I highly recommend it!

Now I’m back home and I have about 4 hours until my bus leaves to Tel Aviv! My next blog entry will be from there!

Egypt Adventures #4

2006-02-14T16:33:00.000-05:00

Egypt Concert Tour is all Planned!

Hello!
I’m very pleased! We have our Egypt Concert Tour all planned out! Four Concerts and two workshops!

March 4th - 9:00pm
El Sawy Cultural Center
Nile Stage (Outdoors)
End of 26th of July street (at Aboul Feda Street)
Zamalek
Tel 7366178
www.culturewheel.com
Tickets are 15 pounds

March 6th - 11:00am - master class at the AUC
Music Studio, room 539
AUC, New Falaki Street

March 7th - 8:00pm - PVA Howard Cafe at the AUC
ADMISSION FREE
Ground Floor, Main Campus access via Mohamad Mahmoud Street

March 9th, 8:00
Raquy and the Rhythm Messengers in Minia!
Thursday March 9th, 8:00pm
1 mustashfa el homiad street
Minia

March 13th – Raquy and the Messengers at the Cairo Jazz Club
time to be announced
www.cairojazzclub.com

Yay! We just signed the contract for the show at Sawy (all in Arabic) ! They misunderstood my e-mail and gave us the wrong weekend, so Bashira will have to get off the plane and come straight to the concert! Yikes! The great Khamis Henkish will be our special guest – it’s an honor to have him in our show!

Today it was another day of running our asses off around Cairo. We got our bus tickets to Tel Aviv, met with Zakareiah Ibrahim, the leader of the Tambura Ensemble in Port Said, met Fati Salama, and set up almost all of our shows.

I need a vacation.

Last night we went to the old market and a bunch more people recognized me from TV. We’re looking into making Raquy and the Cavemen galabias to sell in the States!

Cairo February 12

2006-02-12T13:39:00.000-05:00

Today we made some good headway organizing a show outside of Cairo.
For those of you who don’t know, I got a grant from the American Embassy in Egypt to do a concert, but it can’t be in Cairo, Alex or any tourist place.

Today we went to the American Embassy in Cairo and met with the people in the Cultural Affairs Department who offered me the grant. They explained to me the nature of this grant. I’m an American who plays an instrument that is beloved to the Egyptian people. Therefore it would behoove American popularity if I were to go outside of Cairo into the heart of Egypt to perform for the country folk. The difficult thing is that the people from the Embassy won’t help AT ALL with organizing the event. I have to do everything myself.

At the actual meeting, they were a bit more helpful in spite of themselves. I explained the difficulty in finding a venue outside of Cairo and they brainstormed a little and came up with some names and phone numbers that could be useful.

The best lead so far is a new performance venue in a southern city called Minia. We talked to the guy today and he seems very interested. If it works out we’ll take the girls down there on the train and do a concert. It should be an adventure!

We also talked to this guy Fati Salama who is a well-known musician here. He’s putting together a show the day after tomorrow with like 8 different bands, and Rami and I might play in it. We’ll probably hang out with him tonight.

Rababa Reunion!

Yesterday I had a reunion with Fikry, my rababa teacher. We had a wonderful lesson – he taught me five new songs, all of which I like a lot!

We also looked into flights to Tel Aviv. They are pretty expensive ($320!) so then we checked buses. For $85 you get a bus ticket direct from Cairo to Tel Aviv and back. It’s a 10 hour ride, but if you think about getting to the airport 2 hours early and getting to and from the airports in both cities, flying wouldn’t save us that much time, and there’s something I like about the idea of going from Cairo to Tel Aviv over land. Like the Exodus, but 10 hours instead of 40 years! We’ll see.

Feb 10th—Hafla in the Streets of Cairo!

2006-02-11T17:32:00.000-05:00

Another exciting day in Cairo! We were so happy and relieved to be in
our new apartment that we slept until 3pm! The place is very
comfortable and I felt at home right away.

We went to breakfast at one of our favorite places where we sat up on a
roof next to a minarette and surrounded by trees, and ate our breakfast
while the sun set.

It’s Friday today so the Moazims really jam out! They sing on and on
and at any given time you hear about 4 different ones coming from
different places all at once – pretty haunting stuff!

Then we walked over to the street with the drum stores and I went in to
talk to Gwaret El Fan. It looks like it will actually work out! I
told him that if he would take care of the shipping, I would take them
all, and he agreed! Then he insisted that I try each one to make sure
they are all to my liking, so I proceeded to try out 25 drums! I got an
audience outside the store – people actually pulled up chairs and took
shisha and tea and sat outside the store listening and clapping!

The drums are GORGEOUS and sound fantastic – I’m very pleased. There
were two that we couldn’t get in tune so he promised to fix them and
let me try them again. I took the one I liked best for myself.
So it looks like I’ll be in the drum selling business when I return.
If anyone wants to reserve one, let me know (first come first served).

Another nice discovery at the Gwaret El Fan store was a rababa made out
of a metal drum. It’s great for the States, because, as those of you
who saw the last Messengers show at the Lafayette Grill witnessed, the
skin ones don’t stay in tune. Rababa girls, if you want one, let me
know and I’ll order some.

So while we were in the Gwaret El Fan store, the finals of the African
Cup were on TV (the TV stand was a dumbek). Everyone in Egypt was
either watching this game or listening on the radio. It was really
exciting because the game was really close, but right at the end Egypt
won. You should have heard and seen what happened in the streets of
Cairo when Egypt won. The whole city was one big hafla. People were
drumming and dancing and lighting gas on fire in the streets!

All the guys in the drum stores want pictures of me and the only ones I
have are the post cards of the naked ones! So I keep apologizing to
everyone and saying, “Here this is ‘haram’ (not allowed) but in my
country it’s ok”. They all look at it disapprovingly but so far only
one guy has given it back. Hassan Amegid, the famous drum maker was
especially disapproving (although he put it up on his shelf) and said
“Do me a favor – before your next photo shoot, please put on some jeans
and a tee shirt!”

Cairo Day One—Surprises Galore

2006-02-09T19:00:00.000-05:00

Hello from Cairo!

Our first day in Cairo was very productive. We arrived in the middle
of the night and went straight to the Canadian Hostel where we have a
reservation. It’s very nice and clean with private rooms, gracious
people, a funky lounge and internet. Not bad for $6.50 per person per
night.

This morning we walked out the door into a hamsin –a sand storm from
the desert which covers everything in dust. Nevertheless we went to
our favorite neighborhood, “Garden City” to look for a flat. I had
three guava mango juices and an apple shisha, and we were on our way.

Because of the soccer game finals it was not easy at all to find a
place. We trudged around all day just to hear “oh – there was an empty
apartment here, but somebody just came and took it” over and over.
Finally at the end of the day we found something gorgeous. It
overlooks some king’s tomb (they explained to me that he lives there
but he’s dead). It very luxurious and clean and beautiful. If it were
up to me I’d get rid of all the furniture, but it will have to do for
the month. Ein Sh’alla we can move in tomorrow.

So now that I had an apartment the next thing was to get a drum. I
never bring a drum to Egypt. I made an appointment to meet with
Henkish, a great Egypian tabla player who has a store on the strip of
music stores on Mohammed Ally street. On the way to Henkish I stopped
by my friends at the Gwaret El Fan store where I received some shocking
news.

Surprise # 1 – 25 Raquy Dumbeks

First some background. Mid East Manufacturing wants to make a “Raquy” dumbek and asked me about having them made in Egypt. They told me they wanted to start with just 25 of them and see how they sell. So I called Gwaret El Fan, the company who made me a few Raquy dumbeks
last year, and asked them how much it would be do make 25 of them and
how soon they could make them. They told me a price and a time, and then
I told them that the agent from Mid East Manufacturing would get in
touch with them. Then I gave Mid East Manufacturing the phone number
of Gwaret El Fan and left it up to the to agree on something between
themselves without me in the middle. A few days later I heard from Mid
East Manufacturing that they contacted Gwaret El Fan, but that price
for those drums was too high for them, so they wanted to try to
manufacture the Raquy Dumbeks in the US instead.

Anyway today on my way to meet Henkish, I went in to the store to say
hi to Gwaret El Fan. The guy greeted me warmly.

Gwaret Guy - Your 25 drums with your custom design and your name
written on all of them are ready.

Raquy - But I never ordered the drums!

Gwaret Guy – Yes, you did - you called and told me to make 25 of them

Raquy – No – I just asked you the price – the guys from Mid East
manufacturing called you after and told you it was too expensive

Gwaret Guy – No nobody called. Only you.

Raquy – But they weren’t for me – I can’t take 25 drums – they were for
Mid East Manufacturing, but they don’t want them.

Gwaret – Well, I thought you wanted them so I made them and their
waiting for you in storage.

etc etc etc

So, now I have to figure out what to do. There are 25 custom designed
Raquy Dumbeks here waiting for me. Shit.

Then we met wth Henkish who was very sweet. He’s anxious to do a
concert together, so I hope we’ll work something out. I found an ugly
small drum that sounds amazing and bought it.

Henkish in his Store

Now for Surprise # 2 – We’re Famous!

About five different people today said they saw us on Egyptian
television on the Samir Sabry show recently! The best was when some guy at the kosheri restaurant recognized Rami and me and everyone in the restaurant stood in line for me to sign my autograph. It was so much fun, I wrote out each person’s full name in Arabic (it took a while).

Signing Autographs at the Kosheri Restaurant

So tomorrow, ein shalla, we will move into our apartment, pick up
Rami’s grandfathers old car, and start organizing our concerts.

Cairo, March 12

2005-03-13T11:53:00.000-05:00

The Concert!!!!!

Our concert was last night!

We had Aljezera and Orbit TV there, both of which interviewed us and filmed the concert.

The house was completely packed – The 200 seats were all full and there were about another hundred standing.

I was the only one not standing up on the stage because I’m really not comfortable playing while standing, but I must admit it does look great to have the whole group standing like that!
Rami was so cute. He fit in with Saiid’s troupe perfectly! I bet you can’t even tell which one is him!

Which One is Rami?

Six of Osama’s family came all the way from Damanhoor (3 hours away) to see the concert!

After the intermission I made a speech in Arabic. I introduced myself and then said “Said El Artist is a Hero of Tabla.” The crowd went wild. I thanked him and said what an honor it was for me to share the stage with him. Said told me afterwards that he wanted to make a speech but he was too emotional.

Dust

Bashira, Marjory, Me, Rami and Natalia

Omar and Hummus – They ROCKED!

The crowd was amazing – they were clapping and hooting and whistling throughout the show. There’s nothing like playing Maksum for an Egyptian audience.

I had a BLAST!

My favorite part was when the whole troupe played my piece (Nubian). Said didn’t play but he stayed on the stage to conduct.

Nubian

Saiid Playing His Face

The people from the American Embassy cultural affairs office were there, the same people that didn’t help us with this project one bit and wouldn’t even return my e-mails. After the show they were extremely gushy and said that the next time I come they’ll organize a concert tour all around Egypt for me!

Today Saiiid told me that all morning he was getting phone calls from people flipping out over the show.

He thinks this concert will lead to other things like maybe a concert tour of the Middle East! He really wants mo to come in the summer – I guess August is the time of year in Egypt where lots of stuff is going on.

Why do I feel like I’m going to wake up any minute and say “Wow – what a great dream!

Cairo, March 10 – Day Before the Show

2005-03-10T10:06:00.000-05:00

This afternoon 2pm I was fast asleep and Natalia wakes me up.
“Said’s on the phone”
I found this strange because he doesn’t usually wake up until 3 or 4.
“Hey Said, how’s it going?”
“I didn’t sleep all night – I’m very angry”
“What happened?”
“I went to the Sawy Cultural Center and there are no poster around. It looks like there’s no show. All I saw were advertisements for an oud concert on the same day.”
“Oh shit – Rami will call the Sawy Cultural Center and straighten it out.”
“Ein Sh’alla”
“Ein Sh’alla”

Rami calls Mr. Sawy (the director of the center) and speaks to his secretary:
“Hello, this is Rami”
“Oh Rami, I’m glad you called. There’s something urgent - Mr. Sawy needs to speak to you right away”
“Why, is there some problem”
“Well,,,,uh,,,,,,,what exactly is your and Raquy’s nationalities?”
“American”
“We need to see your passports. Please bring them by right away.”

All this before we’ve had any coffee or anything!
I was starting to think that this show wasn’t gonna happen.

Said, Rami and I and Mr. Sawy decided to have a meeting at 4:00. We raced over to the center, and as we approached we saw a HUGE poster with GIANT pictures of me and Said and the details of the show. “How could Said have missed this” I asked.

Said wasn’t there when we arrived so they first dealt with the passport thing. They just took both our passports, looked them over, Xeroxed the front page a few times, made us sign the copies and gave us our passports back. No big deal.
Then Said showed up. He looked angry and tired from not having slept all night. He spoke strongly to Mr. Sawy explaining the importance of advertising this show. Mr. Sawy was very apologetic and promised to put up lots of posters (two days before the show), to send out an e-mail, press releases and an SMS.

Said and Mr. Sawy forcing themselves to Smile

Said seemed to cheer up slightly but he still looked haggared. He said to me, “This whole thing – the rehearsal, the show, everything, I’m doing for you. I really want there to be a good concert with a nice audience for you.”
“Ein Shalla”
“Ein Shalla”

So that’s it. The crises (what’s the plural for crisis?) have past and the concert is still on (Ein Shalla)

Last night Andrea had a GREAT party at her awesome apartment. That girl really knows how to throw a party!

Cairo, March 8

2005-03-10T09:58:00.000-05:00

Rehearsal on the Nile – Marjory and Azziz

Last night was our gig at the Cairo Jazz Club. It was billed as Raquy and the Cavemen with American Tabla Girls and special guests. We had Miles on the bass and my rababa teacher Fikry.

The place is very nice and well organized. They had big posters of our show all over. The soundman remembered us from LAST YEAR that I like to sit on a table so when we arrived everything was ready for us!

Then first set was ok, but there were not many people. Then we took a break and the place became totally packed! It was so great! People all crowded around to see and they were really into the music – nobody was talking or anything. Everyone did a really good job and we had some very powerful moments! There is nothing like playing a maksum drum solo for an Egyptian audience – they are so into it! As an encore Fikry played and sang an Om Kolthum song annd everyone accompanied him. Afterwards they fed the whole band a delicious meal.

American Tabla Girls – Riq Section

Today we have a day off from rehearsal. I want to take the time to work out my parts for the big concerts. I have so many solos- I want to have my shit together.

All the girls are getting Rababas! I’m gonna start a rababa orchestra in New York!

By the was Fikry the rababa teacher is madly in love with Marjory! He keeps putting his hand on his heart with a pained look on his face and saying “I love that” and pointing to Marjory. He’s already married, but men here are allowed to have four wives at the same time!

Natalia’s First Rababa lesson!

Cairo, March 7

2005-03-07T07:55:00.000-05:00

Must be brief cause we have a crazy day today, but I just wanted to tell
everyone about our awesome rehearsal yesterday!

We blew off the TV thing cause we needed a night with the girls to
rehearse for our show at the Cairo Jazz Club tonight. So we rented a
faluka (small boat) and had our rehearsal on the Nile, literally! It was
so magical! Nobody could hear us so we could play as loud as we wanted
and Bashira and Mariiah danced! The temperature was pefect - there was a
beautiful breeze!

Today we are going again to rehearse with the girls, then we are going to
rehearse with Saiiid then we have a gig at the Cairo Jazz Club!

Cairo, March 6

2005-03-06T15:25:00.000-05:00

Rababa Orchestra, Orbit TV, and Teaching Saiid’s Troupe My Piece!

Today was the most incredible day yet.

Rababa Orchestra

I was invited to sit in with a folkloric orchestra. Bashira basically
just got off the plane and we had to rush over there.

The rehearsal took place in a theater which is part of the Ministry of
Culture. We got to the entrance and the guards made us show ID. I
handed them the Raquy and the Cavemen sticker, which they accept at
most security points as valid ID. The group was actually rehearsing
outside in the yard between the buildings. The conductor was in the
middle with a baton. The group consisted of about 8 rababas, six
mazhurs, six dohulas, zagat (zills), a few frame drums and six
dumbeks. What a powerful sound! Such simple songs but so GOOD! They
have these moments where it gets quiet and one person solos and then
there’s this kick ass dumbek break and then everyone comes in and I
feel like screaming with excitement!

This orchestra is funded by the government. The members get $100 a
month to do two rehearsals a week and performances. Nobody had notes –
the conductor either sings or plays something on the muzhar and
everyone copies him. I picked up the song easily on the rababa, and I
got to play with them!!!!!! Unbelievably fun!

Orbit TV

We had to pry ourselves away from the Rababa orchestra to race over to
Said’s studio to be interviewed and filmed by Orbit TV. Saiid was all
dressed up and wearing these amazing shoes. They had already finished
Said’s interview so it was my turn. I told them about myself and
talked a lot about what an honor it was for me to collaborate with
Saiid.

Then they asked us to play. We played the Nubian drum solo with Rami
and Natalia on bass and Bashira and Marjory on riq.

Then Saiid’s troupe came in and we played the two pieces that we’ve
been working on. Then the TV crew asked us to just jam a little and
Saiid sat on the floor (something he’s picked up from me) with me and
Bashira and we did question answer stuff! Bashira got to take a solo
and she did a GREAT job!

My Piece!

The film crew told us they would be at the concert and they will
interview us again after the show. Then Saiid asked me if I’d like to
teach his troupe one of my pieces!

Teaching Saiid’s Drummers My Composition!

Wow! I explained everything in Arabic. His troupe is SOOOOO good! They
were very attentive and were able to play the whole solo! I’m used to
giving my students written parts, and it was new to teach an entire
piece by ear. Saiid stood in the middle and helped me run the
rehearsal. I’ve never had my pieces played with such a huge sound! What
a thrill! I think Saiid’s drummers enjoyed playing it – its’ definitely
different from other stuff they play. So we’ll have a few more
rehearsals and they’ll play that piece with me and the girls and Rami
in the concert! Also Rami will play with the troupe in the other songs
as well.

Dumbek Section –Hassan, Mohamed, Hassan, Mohamed, etc.

By the way, almost every guy in Saiid’s troupe is named either Hassan
or Mohamed. When I’m working with them I just call every other guy
Mahamed and every other one Hassan. It seems to work.

I can’t express how honored I feel to have this opportunity. This is
the most exciting thing I’ve ever imagined doing. It’s a dream come
true.

Whenever we finish rehearsing I go jam with the boys. There are three
boys. Mido is 5, Omar is 11, and Hummus is 14. They’ve taught me three
pieces so far (the only difference between the three pieces is the
intro) that we play together. They are bright, sweet and talented boys
and it’s so fun to play with them.

Future Cavemen – ‘Artist’ Family Boys

Tomorrow the girls and I are going to be filmed for another TV thing.

Also, Saiid told me tonight that he wants me to come back next year and
make an album with him!

Wow!

Cairo, March 3

2005-03-06T09:25:00.000-05:00

Dear Blog Readers,

I’m sorry I haven’t written in a while. Let me give you an example of what’s been going on here in Egypt.

They want me back on that television show with the girls but we can’t make it, because another televisions channel Orbit TV is coming to Saiid’s studio to interview us and film the rehearsal. Today I’m going to play with the rababa orchestra and then race over to Saiid’s to meet the television crew. The girls are all here. I have so much music to work on for the upcoming concert I don’t know where to begin!

Me and my favorite vegetable

Yesterday was the first rehearsal with Saiid’s troupe. I must say I’m a little intimidated. I arrived at the rehearsal with Saiid and ten drummers were seated around the room holding there instruments ready to play in different sections. There’s basically the dohol section which is a big bass dumbek and the dof section which is an amazing sounding frame drum Everyone was very serious and at attention.

When Saiiid is rehearsing he is a different person – very serious and intimidating. Until this rehearsal it wasn’t clear exactly what we would play and what my role would be, but yesterday I realized that I’m playing the solo part together with Saiiid! (like what I do with Osama) Yikes! We play the intro together and then at some point I play a solo. I can’t describe in words the amazing sound of that big group playing together. They are so tight! Saiid’s arrangements are simple but amazing! Playing that piece was one of the most thrilling things I’ve ever done.

By the way, Saiid has been feeding all of the girls and treating us like princesses. The girls are also having a ball playing with Saiiid’s nephews and adorable five year old son who are all really good dumbek players!

Dumbek Girls Have Arrived!

Playing with Niggum, a GREAT dumbek player

I got to play with an Arabic Big Band the other day

Girls Playing Rali Abui while Saiiid Coaches

Cairo, March 2

2005-03-02T11:09:00.000-05:00

My Egyptian Television Debut

It’s a dusty hot morning in Cairo. They call it a “hamsin” – it gets
very dark and a hot sandy wind comes in from the desert. I don’t mind
it one bit.

The Samir Sabri Show
Last night was the filming of my Egyptian television debut on the
Samir Sabry show which is apparently the most popular talk show in
Egypt. Quite a surreal experience.

I met my rababa teacher in the lobby of the Hilton Nile. He was
totally decked out in his traditional galabia and head piece. I didn’t
have much wardrobe choice here, so I wore my shiny red skirt and a
flowery shirt. Rami wore his blacks.

The place was a huge room with set dinner tables in the middle and
different stages around the perimeters with cameras all around. The
place was in a disordered state when we arrived – there were various
troupes of dancers in costume warming up and all kinds of interesting
personalities roaming around. At one point a fight broke out and
people started yelling at each other.

I was warming up on the tabla, and I noticed that after I played
something, another dumbek way across the room in the bandstand was
answering me. I couldn’t see who it was and I don’t think he could see
me, but we had a half hour long dialogue answering each other back and
forth. Afterwards he came up and introduced himself. He’s a very good
drummer and nice guy and wants to come to America and do a concert with
me.

I met the director and asked him when our segment would be filmed. He
said “Well it’s starting in 10 minutes and you are the second act”.
“Great”, I thought, “I’ll have plenty of time to play with Saiid
afterwards.”

Five hours later I was still sitting there waiting. There were
actually about eight acts each one a half hour long or so! There was a
house band of great musicians. The conductor also played nai and I
loved the percussion section – dumbek, riq and this old guy playing
amazing zagat (zils). Some of the acts were great (a Nubian woman
singer who had these four Nubian guys dancing in the background) and
some of the acts were horrible (some cheesy pop singers and a group of
teenage boy dancers, “The Mad Boys” who did the corniest dance I’ve
ever seen while mouthing horrible English lyrics).

Finally they called us up. Of should I say he called up my teacher.
Samir Sabry actually had no idea I was going to be on the show! He
looked at me holding my rababa and his mouth dropped.” He asked me
“where did you learn rababa?” I said “Fikry taught me.” Then he asked
Rami “and where did you learn tabla?” Rami pointed to me and said “She
taught me” which confused the guy even more. So then he asked us a few
more questions. I answered half in Arabic and half in English which
was ok because Samir Sabry speaks English well and translated
everything to the audience. Then we played a few songs with Fikry and
I on the rababa and Rami drumming. I felt bad because everyone kept on
yelling at Fikry to stop playing so that they could hear me play alone.

The songs went very well. Afterwards the Samir said to me “If I give
you the tabla will you know what to do with it?” “Ein Sh’alla” I
replied. So he asked me to play a drum solo! We played the Nubian
with Rami on the riq and it was really fun. The percussion section of
the band got so excited they joined in! The audience was great and I
think everyone was surprised.

By the time I finished playing I was dying to leave that smoky place
where I had been sitting for so many hours so we didn’t stick around
till the end. So far four different people have told me four different
times that the show will be aired, so who knows.

Bonding with Saiiid
The previous night we spent the entire night at a recording session
with Said at a different studio. We had to wait around for some time
(I’m beginning to recognize this waiting around thing as a theme here
in Egypt) which was cool because I had just made a breakthrough in my
Arabic and we had the best conversation! All in Arabic! We were
talking about so many things and we realized that we have a lot in
common! We took turns interviewing each other. We talked about music,
practicing, family, exercise, food, smoking, traveling, concerts and
all kinds of stuff. Then he tested me on my new Arabic vocabulary
words. He told me that having me around is like adding pepper to his
tabla playing!

I sat right next to him in the booth when he recorded the tabla. He is
such an incredible musician. I learned so much just from watching him
record!

Oh, get this – whenever Saiid has a gig, there’s this guy that comes
with him JUST TO CARRY HIS DRUMS! And then the guy waits there for him
for hours JUST SO THAT HE CAN CARRY HIS DRUMS BACK! Wow – I’d love to
have a guy like that.

Rababa Orchestra
Oh – the other news is that the conductor of the talk show orchestra
(the guy who also played the nai) also conducts a very traditional
orchestra with rababas, muzhirs and dahhol and stuff and he invited me
to come with my rababa this Saturday and sit in! That should be
interesting.

Dumbek Girls are Coming!
Today most of the Dumbek Girls Gone Wild in Egypt are arriving –
Marjory and Mariah in the evening and Natalia after midnight. Bashira’s
coming a few days later. Starting tomorrow night we’ll start having
rehearsals with Saiid and his eight piece troupe and the girls! Saiid
said that Orbit TV is coming to film the first rehearsal and to
interview us and that they will also film the concert! We just picked
up the fliers and there are posters up around town! I’m getting so
excited!

Cairo, February 28

2005-03-01T07:44:00.000-05:00

Lesson, Lessons, Lessons!

4 am Jam Session at Saiid's Studio

I’ve just been banished from Rami’s riq lesson- I’ve been taking over
his lessons. His teacher is way cool – his name is Ashram Isam. He
used to play with his cat Mahumd Hammuda (who’s passed away) and he has
the coolest chops on the riq and on the dumbek! He showed me this
amazing two finger slap and all this other stuff. Every time there’s a
pause in the lesson I make him show me stuff on the dumbek (I just
can’t help it) and then we get carried away. Rami’s getting really
annoyed that I butt into his lessons, so today I’ll try to stay away.

Today is lessons, lessons, lesson! I love it – our teachers come to our
house all dressed up. Today Ashram is wearing a suit and tie.
Yesterday Fikry my rababa teacher had this snazzy galabeia on. All day
with have lessons in our luxury apartment and after midnight we go sit
with Saiid until the morning.

Rami's Riq Lesson

I’m listening to Rami’s lesson and his teacher is chanting the rhythm
to him like this: Bom, britak, britak briitak, britak, bra ta
On the dumbek its different – he says, Bom, ripalak, ripalak, ripalak ect.

The lessons are supposed to be one hour but they always last at least
three hours. Plenty of cigarette and tea breaks. Yesterday my rababa
teacher had to stop the lesson twice in order to pray! I never know
what to do with myself when all of a sudden he starts prostrating and
praying. Also any time the Moazin starts singing outside to call people
to prayer we have to stop playing.

We’ve been waking up at around 1 or 2pm and spending our afternoons
going over the tapes and videos of our lessons. Yesterday we didn’t
make it out to breakfast until 7:30pm! We’re actually on American time.
The girls will have no problem adjusting to our schedule.

I’m having intensive rababa lessons every day now because tomorrow I’ll
be filmed playing with my teacher for Egyptian TV, channel one! It’s
this talk show called Samir Sabry – kindof like Opra Winfry in the
states. It’s going to be aired Thursday night in Egypt and afterwards
all over the Middle East by satellite. I’ll try to get someone to
record it. He said I’ll also be interviewed and I hope I’ll get to
play the dumbek as well. I guess this Samir guy speaks English well.

Ashram just took a cigarette break and is telling us about Ibrahim
Malfify - the greatest riq player in Egypt who played with Um Kol Tum.
He died in ‘61 and was Ashram’s teacher.

Now the lesson is over and Ashram will play a Mahhmud Hammuda style
solo on the dumbek for us to film! Yay! By the way, Mahmud Hammuda is
a legendary tabla player who passed away a few years ago. So far I’ve
met three different great drummers who say, “Mahmud Hammuda was like my
father”. He must have been quite a personatliy. I wish I had met him.

Ashraf Channeling the Spirit of Mahmud Hamuda

There’s so much new material – I’m a little overwhelmed.

By the way, for those of you who are squeamish about cleanliness in
foreign countries, I’ve been drinking tap water, eating at local dives,
and I’ve never felt better. Also every bathroom I’ve visited has been
very clean. From what I’ve heard this is partially due to the strict
Muslim laws on cleanliness. People pray several times a day and must
wash themselves beforehand.

I also discovered the word in Arabic for vegan – its “Siamy”. I guess
there is a sect of Christians here who become vegan for lent (around
one month) every year, so people really understand the concept when I
use that word. At the same time I discovered that fatira dough is
vegan, so now I can join Rami in his 6am fatira binges every night (the
fatira stand near our house is open 24 hours a day and is very tempting
after entire nights of playing music).

Gotta go practice!

Cairo Feb 26, 2005

2005-02-27T09:14:00.000-05:00

“Erda Magnuna” - My New Arabic Name

It’s a beautiful hot breezy sunny day. Today I have my Rababa lesson
in the afternoon.

Our landlady is here now in the apartment putsing around. She feels
very comfortable here and comes here often. The other day we came home
from the market and she was sitting here in our apartment with two
other people watching TV!

Last night we were at Saiid’s again until the morning. We usually drive
over there at around midnight because traffic is not bad then, and we
sit with him until the morning call to prayer. I know its time to go
when he comes around and puts perfume on everyone in the room.

He is showing me some really difficult stuff that I’ll have to sit for
hours to practice! It’s the kind of stuff I could never get from
listening to recordings or even from seeing him play live. He told me
he hardly shows anyone this stuff cause they wouldn’t understand it. I
feel so honored to be receiving this precious knowledge! He hasn’t
written a book or made a DVD or anything like that, so this stuff
hasn’t been documented yet. I’m filming, recording and writing down as
much as possible.

It’s amazing for me to have found the source of the music I’ve been
dedicating myself to. I’m still having trouble speaking and
understanding Arabic, but as soon as I pick up the tabla I have a
crystal clear connection and communication with the people here.

Speaking of communication, last night we brought Andrea Zembehiko to
Saiid’s. She sat there and kindly translated everything that Saiid
said for me. The problem is that she doesn’t really speak Arabic, so
most of the things she translated were from her imagination and then
Rami had to tell me what Saiid really said. Her most successful
translation attempt was when the composer was speaking to us in
English, and Andrea translated everything he said in English (this time
correctly). For example he would say, “this song has a lot of feeling”
and she would say to me “this song has a lot of feeling”.

Oh – Saiid gave me a new name in Arabic – “Erda Magnuna” which means
“Crazy Monkey”. Believe it or not, it’s a compliment, cause they call
someone clever a monkey.

Cairo, February 25, 2005

2005-02-26T10:00:00.000-05:00

Sabine, Mahmud Hamuda, Mango Guava juice and Television Gig

I had a few amazing discoveries yesterday – Sabine, Mahmud Hamuda and
mango guava juice.

Sabine

Sabine is the wife of the legendary Misirli Ahmet the incredibly fast
dumbek virtuoso from Turkey. The day before yesterday I was jamming in
this store and the owner called her so that she could hear me play over
the phone.

She came over yesterday and she ROCKS! She has that Turkish double
thing down! She only plays dumbek and I can tell she’s put lots and
lots of time into practicing.

She lives between Turkey and Egypt (where her family is) but she’s also
French and Syrian (or something like that). She travels all over the
world performing. She’s very beautiful and classy. She doesn’t have
her own band yet, but she’s talking about putting together an all
female band.

Anyway, this girl has CHOPS! Very different style from mine. We
jammed on the maksum and then in karsilama. She has long long fingers
like Natalia. She speaks very highly of her husband and calls him her
“master”. She describes him as very modest, humble and devoted. He
doesn’t teach lessons – he just has a few disciples who he chooses to
teach for no money.

She only plays the clay drums with the skin heads. She buys them here
from that guy I wrote about in my last blog. I’m seriously thinking of
getting a dumbek from him. Its $400 which seems like a lot here, but
its actually not so much for a great instrument. I might try to
bargain with him.

I showed her my notation and she got a big kick out of it. She said I
should e-mail her some samples of it and she’ll show it to her husband!
She only stayed for an hour or so, but we exchanged contacts and if I
come here again or go to Istanbul I’ll call her and if she comes to NY
she’ll call me.

Mahmud Hamuda

I’ve also been hearing a lot about this guy Mahmud Hamuda. He died two
years ago, but everyone speaks about him as the master of the classical
style dumbek playing . Rami’s riq teacher was over yesterday and he
used to play with Hamuda and he started showing me some of his
technique on the dumbek. They do the dum differently, the finger roll
differently, and they do a pop with the right hand. Very cool stuff.
I wrote down a bunch of stuff and I planned another meeting with him to
get more material.

Mango Guava Juice

Yesterday I also discovered half mango half guava juice. It’s like
heaven. A large one costs about 10 cents. I’m gonna drink as many as
possible while I’m here.

TV GIG

I got an interesting phone call from my Rababa teacher, Fikry. He
asked if I would play with him on this very poplar television talk
show! On the Rababba! After only two lessons! I said of course I
would. He’ll find out the date and let me know.

Henkish

We were supposed to meet with this Henkish superstar dumbek guy
yesterday but we had to blow him off cause we were so busy with other
stuff! Hopefully we’ll see him today.

Rami's Cousin's Party

Rami's cousin had an engagement party last night so instead of going to
Saiid's we went to the party. AMAZING food and very fun group of
people. Rami's cousins are all gorgeous. We played for them and they
were so into it - they were all clapping and ululating and dancing.!

Rami and his cousins

Cairo, Sat Feb 25

2005-02-26T09:58:00.000-05:00

We’re now officially on the sleep schedule of Saiid- we go to sleep at
dawn and wake up at 2 pm.

Last night was the best night I’ve had at Saiid’s so far. They
finished the recording they were working on so it wasn’t so crazy and
there weren’t many people around, so Saiid was in hang out mode. When
we arrived, Saiid was playing badgamon with this other great - a
violinist named Alfred Gamil. I actually met him in the states years
ago at Simon Shaheen’s music camp. He remembered how I play the bones
and told Saiid about it, so they really wanted to hear me play them,
but I forgot to bring them to Egypt, so they asked the boy to bring
four spoons and I tried to do my bones solo on the spoons (with not
much success). They really want me to play bones now on the concert,
so I hope the girls can bring them for me.

Saiid was really inspired last night and he was showing us some cool
shit on the dumbek! He has another dum that’s higher and it sounds
really cool when he plays it back and forth with the real dum. He said
that the 2nd dum is like how a beginner students tries to play the real
dum. We have this joke now that after he shows off his stuff on the
dumbek he says, “so, what do you think – can I play tabla?” and I
answer, “nus nus” (so so).

He also played for us some of his old recordings – AMAZING drum solos.
He’s really an incredible composer and I’m not the only one that rips
off his compositions- drummers from all over the world copy his stuff.

Hafla Last Night at Saiid’s Studio
From Left to Right Ali, Shlum, Saiid, Me, Miles, Dr. Alfred Gamil

Saiid also talked about his philosophy of drumming – he said the dumbek
is like the sea. You can always catch the same kind of fish (dum, tek,
ka) or you can harvest the bounty of the ocean and look for all kinds
of different fish. He’s really opening my mind.

We met the other guy Henkish yesterday – very nice man and he had some
cool stuff on the dumbek as well. We’re filming this stuff as much as
possible and I’m writing stuff down. I can’t believe how much material
I’m collecting!

Today I want to go over stuff and figure out what I’m doing in the
concert.

Cairo, February 24th, 20005

2005-02-24T09:14:00.000-05:00

Wow – this place is really blowing my mind.

First of all, in the morning we had a meeting with the head of the AUC
(American University in Cairo) music department. What a nice guy –
he’s a pianist and composer. He kindof reminded me of an Egyptian
Gershwin.

As unbelievable as it seems, he’s had a hard time finding someone to
teach dumbek! He said that there’s a lot of amazing players here but
that they can’t really teach in English. He organized a master class
for me to teach. He’s making posters a fliers and really advertising
it.

He was very interested in my notation system and he fipped out when we
showed him a video of our Avenue B concert.

He said that he wants to arrange for me to come next year for 8 weeks
and teach a course in middle eastern drumming! Those gigs are sweet,
cause you make an American salary, but your living expenses are next to
nothing! I told him, lets make it for the winter – the weather here is
just perfect.

Also we hung out on Muhammed Ali street and jammed with some amazing
dumbek players! It was a blast.

We went to this store that has the nicest dumbeks in Egypt. They are
$400 each, but GORGEOUS – I’ve never seen a nicer dumbek. Anyway, I
was playing one and the owner of the store, Hassan Ali Amediit rushed
to the phone and dialed a number and held it up to me as I played.
Then we handed me the phone and it turns out it was Misserli Ahhmed’s
wife Sabine! I’ve heard about her that she’s a really good drummer!
She said “was that you playing? I want to meet you!” So she’s coming
over today or tomorrow. By the way for those of you who don’t know,
Misserli Ahmed is the number one dumbek player in Turkey! She sounds
very cool and classy. She’s part Egyptian, part Syrian and part
Turkish.

Then we went to Saiids and I had an AMAZING rabbaba lesson. Saiid came
downstairs in the middle of the lesson with a woman in a higab (head
scarf) who he said was one of the greatest dancers in Egypt Fikry and
I played the rabbaba, Saiiid played the dumbek and this woman danced –
WOW , what a hafla! The dancer was so different from American dancers.
She was something else - very subtle and the dancing was all about the
music.

Fikry, my AWESOME Rabba Teacher

Today we’re having a riq lesson and we’re supposed to meet this guy
who’s the other great tabla player here besides Saiid – his name is
Henkish.

The people here are the most charming and hospitable of any country
I’ve been to. We hang out in Saiiids studio and people are constantly
bringing us tea, cofffe, fruit juices, ect. And if we stay late enough
at the Studio at around 3 am, Saiid orders these Egyptian pizza- like
things called ‘fatiras” – filo dough filled with all kinds of things.
It reminds me off college kids getting the munchies and ordering pizza
in the middle of the night. Last night after the fatiras he took out
this bottle and went around the room putting sandal wood oil on
everyone – now everything I have smells of it.

Last night Saiiid and I had a meeting about the concert. We decided
that we will play a few numbers together, I’ll play some one my Raquy
and the Cavemen material with Shlum and the girls, and he’ll do
something with that kid Hummus and he’ll also do his famous drum solo
on his cheeks (He plays his cheeks like a drum into the microphone and
gets AMAZING sounds!). We’ll do like an hour show – I think it will be
very nice. I asked about having the girls dance and he said “NO WAY”.
It would have been nice for the girls to dance, but they’ll still get a
chance to drum with us.

Gotta go – its 3:00pm – time for breakfast!

Cairo, Tuesday, February 22, 2005

2005-02-23T11:34:00.000-05:00

NEWS UPDATE!!!!!!!
TABLA EXTRAVEGANZA CONCERT on the NILE!
MARCH 11TH, 8:00 pm
STARRING SAIID EL ARTIST AND MOI!
With Rami, Dumbek Girls Gone Wild and Saiid’s Troupe
SAKIA EL SAWY CULTURAL CENTER
UNDER 26 OF JULY BRIDGE, ZAMALEK
www.culturewheel.com

Tonight I’m staying home – hallas!

It hit me last night at Saiiid’s that I haven’t had any off time since
I got to this country! First we had to run around to get the apartment.
Then we had to run around to organize this concert. And every night
we’ve been going to Saiid until the wee hours of the morning. It’s
been amazing. Some of the best musicians in Egypt hang out at his
place – playing backgammon, eating lib (seeds), jamming and smoking
stuff. At the same time there’s this composer who is recording his
music in Saiid’s recording studio. The music is so cool – very
difficult and interesting and he’s getting amazing musicians in to
record. No other women hang out there, and no other pink people
besides me. Im learning a lot about music and about what to say in
Arabic when you pass a ....... (censored by Egyptian police).

Last night I jammed with this kid “Hummus” – Saiid’s adorable 15 year
old nephew who is quite good on the dumbek!

Hummus Jamming Under the Surveillance of Uncle Saiid

I also had my first lesson on the Rababa – the Egyptian version of the
kemenche. It’s even more loud and obnoxious than my loud kemenche.
Fishky’s gonna hate it.

Saiid got the best Rababa player in Egypt to come to the studio and
give me a lessons, This guy is so kick ass. I’m gonna take a lesson
every other day. He doesn’t speak a word of English. The funny thing
was that he came to give me a lesson and he didn’t bring his
instrument! I said “ how can we have a lesson if you don’t have a
rabbaba?” So for the first lesson we passed mine back and forth and
next lesson (Ein Shallah) he’ll bring his own. But what a musician!
I’ll see if I can put a sample of his playing on the blog.

The big news is that we have a concert in the best possible place – an
outdoor theater on the Nile in the middle of downtown Cairo!!!!!! Yay!
I’m so happy! It’s underneath a bridge that used to be a garbage dump
but this guy Mr. Sawy made it into an amazing cultural center with
different stages and art galleries,ect. We met with him and I showed
him footage from a Raquy and the Cavemen concert and he loved it. He
also loves Saiid so he said we could play there! Yay! (For details
see above). I’m very excited. Our’s is the outdoor stage – its very
big and the space can easily hold a few hundred people. It’s just
perfect!!!! Said is excited about having the “Dumbek Girls Gone Wild”
perform with us. Yay!

Now I can relax a little – I just have to rehearse with Saiid and
anyone else who’s playing with us. Today this guy Miles from LA came
over who plays upright bass. Very nice and very tall and very good
musician! We jammed all day – he’s learning the bass part to Dust and
Raquin – Ein Shalla he’ll play with us on some concerts.

Rehearsal with Miles in our Luxury Apartment

Oh – a few interesting things I’ve learned about the dumbek!

1 – In the old days these guys used to come around to the Egyptian
neighborhoods with cars and yell “Bring out your old clothes” and in
exchange for old clothes, the people got a dumbek! That’s why so many
people in Egypt play dumbek! (according to Saiiid)

2- When I studied in India I learned the importance of respecting your
instrument – for example you should never put your feet on the drum.
This theory was shattered for me when Saiid el Artist, the greatest
dumbek player in Egypt, plopped his butt down on my drum in order to
stretch the skin – he sat on it for about 20 minutes!

By the way, is anyone reading this? Please write to me with your
comments! I’d love to hear from you!

Cairo, Sunday February 20th

2005-02-21T01:51:00.000-05:00

I’m sitting in an Ahawa (nargila café) with my laptop. It’s a dusty
hot morning. Rami went to settle a dispute between the guy who took us
to the guy who took us to the guy who took us to the landlord and the
guy who took us to the guy who took us to the landlord. We made the
mistake of giving them a big bill and telling them to split it – now
one of them is banging on our door every day complaining that he didn’t
get enough.

Yesterday I had my first meeting with Saiid!

I spent all day practicing in the park in order to get ready. A group
of kids gathered around me to listen and I ended up speaking to them
for quite a while. It was the first time I was on my own speaking
Arabic with no English speakers around to help me. It was amazing - we
actually talked about many things and understood each other! But it
was exhausting.

We got to the Artistek Studios and waited for Saiid. He has a building
with an office, a recording studio and a practice space. The place is
full of dumbeks! He has a bunch of guys that work for him and just
hang out in the studio and answer the phone and make tea and stuff.
Rami positioned himself with the video camera so that he could film the
meeting between me and Saiiid.

Finally he came. He's probably in his mid fifties. He's very handsome.
He's pretty thin and he chain smokes. He goes to sleep every day after
the morning prayer (6 am). All night he sits in his studio and hangs
out , rehearses, records, smokes,ect.

He was very excited to see us. We spent the first few hors listening
to the stuff he’s been working on and he listened to the stuff I’ve
been working on. He showed us this TV program where they interviewed
him about the tabla (dumbek) and he played with a big ensemble. The
ensemble has violins, ouds, singers, all kinds of percussion ect, but
everything centers around him on the dumbek. He stands in the middle
of everyone with the dumbek on his knee and a flashing smile and
everyone else is there to accompany him. The funniest thing is that
all the words of the singers are about the dumbek, for example, “where
is the Dum? Here is the Dum!” and stuff like that. He definitely has
“star” quality. Even yesterday, he lit up whenever Rami turned on the
video camera.

At one point we listened to his version of “Osama” (the song that I
play that I learned from Osama that was actually written by Said) and
then my version of the same song from my new cd. He didn’t seem to
mind that I ripped off his tune, especially after I told him that we
gave him credit for the composition. Every time he showed me a new
composition I jokingly said, “Great, now there’s another song for me to
copy!”

It’s nice to be able to joke in Arabic. My first attempt was a flop.
I met a guy named “Arrfa” and arrfa also means “to know” so I said
“Delwati ana arrfa arrfa – cha cha cha” (Now I know Arrfa – ha ha ha”)
and was met with a blank stare.

Oh – back to Saiid. So after shooting the shit for a few hours (and in
hailing unbelievable amounts of second hand smoke) I asked him when
will we start practicing. He said tomorrow. But I knew that if I
egged him on he would play so I asked him to tune my drum and we ended
up jamming! It was really fun. He showed me another piece called
“Alexandria” (that’s where he’s from). We really hit it off playing
wise. I can mimic him well and he has some new techniques that are
really cool. He said “I wasn’t in the mood to play but you draw it out
of me”

Oh and about the concert. He’s still saying “ein shalla”. Apparently
he had a falling out with the Cairo Opera House which is the most
prestigious venue in Egypt (they haven’t paid him for his concert
there). He’ like to play there again, but his pride prevents him from
calling there. But he really wants to have a concert. He was
especially excited when I told him about my troupe of girl drummers
arriving next week (he also wanted to know what they looked like and if
they were married). He’s also excited about the kemenche. I’ll bring
it tonight when I go there.

Saiid did call Channel One while we were there and told them about me
and told them to come tomorrow to the first rehearsal. So I believe
there will be a concert (Eih Sh’alla) but its not clear when or where.

He basically said that we should come to his studio every evening and
hang out there until the morning with him. That will be interesting,
especially since Rami is experiencing some kind of bizarre reverse jet
lag – he’s up putzing around humming songs every morning at 9 am! This
is the same Rami who usually can’t form a coherent sentence before
2:30pm. But I figure that after a few nights with Saiid, Rami will
adjust to the night schedule, which is actually more like New York
time!

Well that’s it for now – Rami and I decided that having shisha in the
morning before breakfast is kind of like having a glass of apple juice.

Oh – did I mention that we live in a luxury apartment in the center of
town? I LOVE our apartment. And our neighborhood. It takes about 25
minutes to drive to Saiid – not bad. And we can walk to all the
downtown hot spots. There are tons of great cafes and restaurants here
and there’s a beautiful park where I can practice right in front of our
house! Its just perfect. I’m planning a big party for our last week.
You’re all invited!

February 18th, Cairo

2005-02-19T17:07:00.000-05:00

Hello Everybody.

Well, I splurged on a flat, and I'm thrilled about it!

We ended up the first night staying in a hotel in a neighborhood called
Garden City, which is right on the Nile, very centrally located. It's
walking disctance from downtown and Mohammud Ally street with all the drum stores, ect. Very bustling but comfortable - big sidewalks ect. We were supposed to go to Saiid's brother near the Pyramids to find a place, but I said, lets look around here for the hell of it even though everybody said its very expensive.

We walked around and started asking the Boabs - they are the guys that sit in the buildings (kindof like the super) and take care of things. So after we asked about 6 different ones, we got one that called his friend, and he took us to his friend, and then his friend got his dad, and his dad made some calls and we ended up with a parade of guys following us around helping us find a place.

So this place is in a luxury building right in front of a big beautiful public park. It has a gorgeous marbel entrance and a beautiful elevator. The flat is absolutely GORGEOUS!!!!! It has a huge living room with all kinds of different lighting options that the landlady showed us one by one. It has a nice big bedroom with big windows looking over trees. The kitchen is fully equiped and nice, there are two nice bathrooms. Its so wonderful. After some bargaining, we agreed on about $350 for the month (which came out to more like $400 after we tipped everyone who helped us find it), which is more than we expected, but I am totally thrilled. I couldn't imagine a nicer neighborhood or a nicer apartment!

Last night we just walked all over the city. Cairo by night is so cool - its alot less crowded, but there's still stuff happening. For example at 3:30am we were walking up this little ally and we came upon an open barber shop! It was great cause I've been nagging Rami to get a haircut for a couple months now. The guy seemed inspired - he cut Rami's hair as if he was working on work of art. Rami said he never had such a nice haircut.

We also had a very nice meal. It was the standard stuff - ful, falafel, ect, but they gave us each a huge pile of arrugala, scallions, lime and an entire head of lettuce. We crunched away.

Today is the first day I really feel relaxed now that we have a flat. The plan is to visit Rami's grandmother. I also have to practice. Saiid is coming back from Jordan tonight, so I need to be in top shape. I tuned the mystucal drum and it sounds AWESOME!!!

I still don't know what to do about my hair. Now its part dread locks, part braids, and I just stuffed the whole mess in big braids. I'm afraid to touch it. I think I'll go to a beauty parlor here and have them wash and comb it.

Oh - the Arabic - I haven't learned the alphabet yet, so I can't read or write, but I've been speaking quite a lot. My problem is that I can usually say what I want, but if the person answering me uses one or two words I don't know, I cant understand them. But I feel a difference even after one day its getting easier.

Oh, and the weather. Its HOT out today, probably in the low 80's. At night it gets down to the low 60's. Absolutely perfect!!!!! I don't understand why this is the "off" season in Egypt. I can't imagine nicer weather.

Here is my phone number:

My Cell phone - 011- 2012- 592-8254

To be continued!

February 17th, 12 pm, Cairo

2005-02-17T10:04:00.000-05:00

Good Morning Cairo!!!

It’s a beautiful day! Whoopee! We’re sitting outside having coffee
and its WARM OUT!!!!!

The hafla at the airport was amazing. We got it all on film. Osama’s
family was just as I expected – adorable. His mother has his face! Or
should I say he has her face! She presented me with a bright orange
robe and a bright orange scarf – very sweet.

And the drum!!!!! I’ve never seen such a drum! It’s tuned too high now
– I must find a tuner and tune it – its small but incredibly heavy. I
think the sound will be amazing!

Other than tuning the drum and fixing my hair, the first priority today
is finding a flat. Right now we’re at a hotel in Garden City which is
about $28 a night for two people which is not bad, but it will be much
better to have our own place.

Last night after the airport hafla we got our wheels and cruised around
Cairo by night. We found an open restaurant at 4:30 am and opened a
huge table of delicious veggi stuff – foul, falafel, all kinds of
potatoes, salads, ect. Then we had my favorite barley tea. The whole
thing came to $1. Then we fell asleep to the sound of the morning call
too prayer.

Gotta go! Lots to do today!

February 15th, 7:30pm, Amsterdam

2005-02-17T10:02:00.000-05:00

So we made it back to the airport in plenty of time!
It was actually a pleasant flight to Amsterdam. There was a nice movie
and I had luckly brought left over tofu stuffed with mushrooms a la
Rami which was good since there was no veggi food.

My only mistake was that I decided to start taking out my braids on the
flight – you see, once I start I become obsessive about it and cannot
stop until they’re all out. So now the braids are out and my hair is
totally knotty and staticky, and I don’t have a brush or a scrunchy!
What will I do!?!? Every one and his brother is coming to meet me at the
airport and I look like the Wild Woman of Hangui!

Amsterdam was nice – Rami and I made it out of the airport in record
time – he was determined to have as much quality Amsterdam time as
possible so we raced through. The airport is one of the nicest I’ve
seen – it works well – no long lines and everything’s convenient. We
put all our carry ons in a locker so we didn’t have to shlep them
around the city. There is a tram from the airport terminal to the
center of town.

Rami knew exactly which Coffee Shops to go to and we spent the day
going from one to the other. It was quite cold, much more so than New
York but I felt ok with a wool sweater, a hood, a hat, a pashmina
scarf, and Rami’s scarf. We sat in smoky coffee shops filled with
blurry – eyed people and drank tea after tea. Rami was in Heaven,

Now we’re on the plane to Cairo. My goal is to learn the Arabic
alphabet on this flight from a book I have but I’m pretty tired.

When I arrive I need to make a bee line for the ladies room and try to
fix my hair somewhat presentable for the airport hafla.

JFK February 15

2005-02-17T09:00:00.000-05:00

Here I am at the airport! At the last minute I decided to take my
laptop even though I was so tired of my laptop! For the last month
I’ve been working on my book all day because I wanted so much to finish
it before my trip! And I did! Today I mailed in my book to be made
500 copies! What a great feeling!

Also today we turned in the final copy of the new album “Jordan” to be
duplicated. Hopefully when I return I’ll have a new book and a new cd
out!

Osama actually took us to the airport, which was very sweet of him. He
felt obliged to do so because he had asked me if I could take a small
package for him to his family in Egypt and I said “sure” and he showed
up with two huge suitcases that I could hardly lift!

It’s a good thing they didn’t ask the standard security questions they
usually ask. Imagine if they asked “Did you pack your bags yourself?”
and if I replied, “Oh no, my friend Osama asked me to take these two
big suitcases for him- I have no idea what’s inside.”

I’m expecting an interesting hafla when we arrive at the airport in
Egypt at 1:00am. Among the people who may be there to meet us are:

Osama’s father mother and brother, bringing Osama’s mystical first
dumbek as a gift to me. Every since I met Osama he’s been telling me
about this drum – how they don’t make them like that anymore and how I
would sound so good on it. I look forward to trying it.

Saiid El- Artist’s son
Saiid El Artist, the famous dumbek player I’m going to perform with
will actually be giving a concert in Jordan when I arrive so he’s
sending his son to pick me up. Apparently he has organized an
apartment near him for us to rent.

Rami’s Cousins
Rami’s cousins are supposedly bringing us Rami’s late grandfather’s
Fiat so that we’ll have wheels for the month.

Andrea Zembehiko
She also offered to come to the airport. She arrived in Egypt a few
days ago and she’s been calling me and speaking English with an
Egyptian accent. Every time she calls she has 50 seconds on her phone
card so we get cut off after a few sentences.

But before that I have seven hours in Amsterdam with Rami! I hope we
make it back to the airport in time!

Xoxoxo
Raquy