Music of Egypt
Music has been an integral part of Egyptian culture since antiquity in Egypt. Egyptian music had a significant impact on the development of ancient Greek music, and via the Greeks it was important to early European music well into the Middle Ages. Due to the thousands of-years long dominance of Egypt over its neighbors, Egyptian culture, including music and musical instruments, was very influential in the surrounding regions; for instance, the instruments claimed in the Bible to have been played by the ancient Hebrews are all Egyptian instruments as established by Egyptian archaeology. Egyptian modern music is considered as a main core of Middle Eastern and Oriental music as it has a huge influence on the region due to the popularity and huge influence of Egyptian cinema and music industries, owing to the political influence Egypt has on its neighboring countries, as well as Egypt producing the most accomplished musicians and composers in the region, specially in the 20th century, a lot of them are of international stature.[1] The tonal structure music in the East is defined by the maqamat, loosely similar to the Western modes, while the rhythm in the East is governed by the iqa'at, standard rhythmic modes formed by combinations of accented and unaccented beats and rests.
Religious music in Egypt[edit]
Religious music remains an essential part of traditional Sufi Muslim and Coptic Christian celebrations called mulids. Mulids are held in Egypt to celebrate the saint of a particular church or an exalted local Muslim figure. Muslim mulids are related to the Sufi zikr ritual. The Egyptian flute, called the ney, is commonly played at mulids. The liturgical music of the Alexandrian Rite also constitutes an important element of Egyptian music and is said to have preserved many features of ancient Egyptian music.
Folkloric music[edit]
Egyptian folk music, including the traditional Sufi dhikr rituals in Egypt, are the closest contemporary music genre to ancient Egyptian music, having preserved many of its features, rhythms, and instruments.[8][9]
Egyptian musical instruments[edit]
A typical early 20th century Egyptian ensemble comprising the Oud, qanun, violin, ney, and cello.
Many of the modern day instruments, both in the East and the West, trace their roots back to ancient Egypt, and many ancient Egyptian instruments are still used in Egypt today, such as the darbuka, the simsimiyya, the Egyptian ney, among other instruments.
During the Abbasid and Ottoman dynasty Egypt was one of the main musical hubs in the middle east and therefore after the fall of the Ottoman Empire in 1923 Egypt became the capital of music in the Arabic-speaking world where classical instruments such as the oud, qanun, and ney were widely used. The typical takht (ensemble) consisted of an Oud player, qanun player, ney player and violin player. The takht (literally meaning a sofa) was the most common form of ensembles in the early 20th century before the adoption of more orchestral instruments which were introduced by composers such as Mohamed El Qasabgi, Riad El Sunbati and Mohammed Abdel Wahab.
Electronic music[edit]
One of the most respected early electronic music composers, Halim El-Dabh, is an Egyptian. Active at the same time, or perhaps earlier than, the French electronic pioneers from the Studio d’Essai, he is one of, if not the, earliest composer of purely electronic music. In 1944 he composed the earliest known work of tape music, or musique concrète, called The Expression of Zar, which he composed in Egypt, while still a student in Cairo, by capturing sounds from the streets of Egypt on a wire recorder.
The Egyptian electronic music scene has gained a mainstream foothold in the forms of techno, trance, and dance pop DJs such as Aly & Fila. In the 2010s, Mahraganat music, an Egyptian form of electronic music which often contains political lyrics, gained popularity both inside and outside Egypt.[10]
Broken Egyptian sistrum
Egyptian sistrum
Ancient Egyptian long flute
Ancient Egyptian stringed instruments
Ancient Egyptian with two-sided drum
Ancient Egyptian music band
Late-style Egyptian lyre
Ancient Egyptian woman playing drum
Egyptian lyre
In the 20th and early 21st centuries, interest in the music of the pharaonic/ancient Egyptian period began to grow, inspired by the research of such foreign-born musicologists as Hans Hickmann, who lived and worked in Egypt. By the early 21st century, Egyptian musicians and musicologists led by the Egyptian musicology professor Khairy el-Malt at Helwan University in Cairo had begun to reconstruct musical instruments of ancient Egypt, a project that is ongoing.[11]