Review: 1000 Arabic songs

Subject: Review: 1000 Arabic songs
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 30 May 04 - 08:41 PM

Over 1000 full length Arabic songs to listen to at the 4arabs Music website- !1000 songs 1000!. You can copy them, too.

A great resource, but unfortunately, English translations are lacking. Twenty-five songs by Fayrouz, 13 by El-Funoun, and many others. Don't miss Diana Karazon- very up-to-date. 150 singers, songs mostly from Egypt, Lebanon, Palestine and Syria, but others from all over the Arab-speaking world.

If you are adventurous, try out the Free Match Maker!
The E-Cards are worth a look. Other services, including Learn Arabic in 3 Hours.

www.4arabs.com/music
4arabs music

Subject: RE: Review: 1000 Arabic songs
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 30 May 04 - 08:50 PM

Postscript- Their Arab Shopping Center is tied to Amazon.
Politicians fail but Amazon conquers all.

Subject: RE: Review: 1000 Arabic songs
From: Once Famous
Date: 30 May 04 - 11:18 PM

I will not buy this.

Subject: RE: Review: 1000 Arabic songs
From: Rabbi-Sol
Date: 30 May 04 - 11:33 PM

In order to get a balanced view, I think that we can furnish a web site that has over 1000 Hebrew songs. They are archived in streaming audio. It is www.isrealnn.com/english/radio/jukebox/juke.htm   Enjoy.
SOL ZELLER

Subject: RE: Review: 1000 Arabic songs
From: Sorcha
Date: 30 May 04 - 11:42 PM

Martin, why do you say that?

Subject: RE: Review: 1000 Arabic songs
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 30 May 04 - 11:46 PM

Twenty-odd years ago I used to have to sit up working most of the night quite often. UK radio stations shut down not long after midnight in those days. What could I find to listen to? Not very much. Radio Moscow (earnest but dull) or Voice of America (naked propaganda, just as dull but without the intelligence or intellectual honesty of the Russian service).

What else? The Arabic services. Well, so far as I could tell. I don't understand a word of the languages involved. I do remember the music, though. Reception was not good -it came and went- but it was well worth hearing, and I learned the beginnings of approaches to music that had been outside my experience.

Thanks for the link to this resource. I'll certainly be making use of it.

Subject: RE: Review: 1000 Arabic songs
From: Malcolm Douglas
Date: 31 May 04 - 12:00 AM

I should also mention that I'm a little puzzled as to why the pseudonymous "Rabbi Sol" seems to feel that people should not listen to Arabic music without listening also to Hebrew music. Both have their individual (but mostly, shared) virtues and are, to the average Western European ear, very similar.

Where does "balance" enter into the equation? Perhaps the good "rabbi" is an American: I do realise that there are some odd ideas circulating there about the relative value of other cultural traditions, though I confess to being puzzled by some of the apparent prejudices and preconceptions involved. Are there perhaps political messages in the music that those who, like me, understand not a word of Arabic or Hebrew might be unduly influenced by if we do not listen to both?

Please do explain.

Subject: RE: Review: 1000 Arabic songs
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 31 May 04 - 01:06 PM

When does balance have only one side?
In another thread started by "Rabbi-Sol" he is looking for the Zionist "There are two sides to the Jordan and that is ours too."

Subject: RE: Review: 1000 Arabic songs
From: Wilfried Schaum
Date: 31 May 04 - 01:10 PM

Bloody hell - keep politics out! We're talking about songs here, and Firuz is a wonderful singer, Um Kulthum also.

Wilfried

Subject: RE: Review: 1000 Arabic songs
From: Rabbi-Sol
Date: 31 May 04 - 03:25 PM

On a previous thread started by me about a Zionist song, entitled, The Little Bird, Q introduced a Palestinian song with similar words, to show the position of the other side. Similarly, on this thread started by Q about 1000 Arabic songs, I felt that readers should be exposed to some Hebrew songs as well. Although you may not understand the language, you will notice the similarity of the music.
As our last poster said, let us keep politics out and talk about songs. That is precisely what I am trying to do here. If we can understand each other through our music, we can accomplish a whole lot more than the politicians can with their weapons. In fact, the great majority of the songs on the site that I mentioned are non-political and have their origins in scripture and prayers that both Jews & Muslims hold sacred. What better way to achieve mutual understanding than through shared heritage and culture. SOL ZELLER

Subject: RE: Review: 1000 Arabic songs
From: Maryrrf
Date: 31 May 04 - 04:12 PM

I used to listen to Arabic music a lot, and would count it as one of my many influences. Um Kulthum, Fairuz, Abd el Halim Hafez - great singers, lovely voices from a noble musical tradition. I don't think politics need enter into it at all. I've also greatly enjoyed Sephardic Jewish music and Klezmer.

Subject: RE: Review: 1000 Arabic songs
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 31 May 04 - 04:47 PM

Could you check that address, Sol: www.isrealnn.com/english/radio/jukebox/juke.htm

It just comes up as an error message.

"What better way to achieve mutual understanding than through shared heritage and culture." Absolutely. Fights within families can be the most vicious, but finding out about the shared heritage, and building on it, can be a way of building bridges.

Arguing out the political issues has a place, especially when it can be done without descending into personal attacks and tantrums - but there is no reason that should happen in threads that are about music. I hope we can leave it out this time. (If someone's absolutely bursting to make a political comment, maybe make it elsewhere, and stick a link to it on this thread?)

That's a great site that Q found for us - I'd love to know more about Arab musical traditions. (Ever since I saw them playing bodhrans in Morocco years ago.) And it'd be good to have the link Rabbi-sol tried to give us, for the reasons he gave.

Subject: RE: Review: 1000 Arabic songs
From: Rabbi-Sol
Date: 31 May 04 - 07:06 PM

McGrath, I do not know why the link did not come up. To get to the site, do a Google search for Arutz Sheva Jukebox. The first or second item that comes up will get you directly on to the page. As folk song enthusiasts, we should endeavor to learn about all traditions and cultures through their music. Even though I am an Orthodox Jew, my collection of Irish folk music far exceeds my Jewish collection. My love of Irish music goes all the way back to The Clancy Brothers & Tommy Makem, continues with The Wolf Tones, and more recently with Tony Kenny whom I have gotten to know personally. One who listens to the songs of The Wolfe Tones can get a better understanding of the passionate feelings that exits in Palestine. It is basicaly the Orange & the Green in a different setting where emotions often overpower reason, with disasterous (bloody) consequences. SOL ZELLER

Subject: RE: Review: 1000 Arabic songs
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 31 May 04 - 08:42 PM

Apparently it needs to be:

http://www.israelnn.com/english/radio/jukebox/Fjuke.htm

rather than:

http://www.isrealnn.com/english/radio/jukebox/juke.htm

Giving a blue clicky: Israeli juke box

................

Sol is right about the parallels with Northern Ireland - even down to the fact that Republicans tend to sympathise more readily with the Palestinian case, and Loyalists with the Israeli case. But I suggest that if anyone wants to discuss that, another thread would be a better place.

..............

I note in the list there, it's "Hassidic", "Mizrachi" or "Israeli" - there doesn't seem to be any separate section for Yemeni or Moroccan or Iraqi Jewish music. which I'd imagine would be where the closest links with Arab traditions would be found.

Subject: RE: Review: 1000 Arabic songs
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 31 May 04 - 09:08 PM

Having my curiosity alerted, I did a bit of googling and came up with this "A Jukebox of Jewish-Arabic Music", which has some pretty good stuff on it. (The one at the bottom with L'ENSEMBLE NAGUILA is particularly interesting, I thought.)

Subject: RE: Review: 1000 Arabic songs
From: Rabbi-Sol
Date: 31 May 04 - 10:08 PM

McGrath, The Yemeni, Moroccan, or Iraqi Jewish music would be under the "Mizrachi" heading. The Hebrew word Mizrach is translated as east, hence Mizrachi is eastern. The Hasidic songs on this site are mostly from American singers and composers, including many who are in fact anti-zionist. Of course the Israeli section are songs composed in Israel after statehood in 1948, some contemporary and some real oldies. SOL ZELLER