Filed under: Egypt
Omar Khorshid is where all this insanity started for me, although I did not know it at the time.
Back in 2005, while I was in San Francisco for my job, a friend of mine took me to Aquarius Records, where I picked up a disc called “Radio Morocco“. Although I had purchased a few other compilations of 60’s and early 70’s music from India, Asia and Turkey, as well as discs by Ananda Shankar and Takeshi Terauchi in the past… This was different. What was this music even called? I had no idea. So, to the internet. I started Google-ing everything I could think of. Eventually, I stumbled on some information about Omar Khorshid.
Omar was originally from Egypt, where he got his start playing with Umm Khulthum, Mohammed Abdel Wahab, and Abdel Halim Hafez. He was the first person to introduce electric guitar into Arab music. Apparently, his brother Elhamy tried to imitate his sound but was supposedly not as popular as Omar.
Besides being a musician, Omar was also an actor as well as having scored thirteen motion picture soundtracks. In 1971 he won the Premier Prize at the Film Festival of Tachkand for his music for the film “Abnati El Aziza” (“A Teen’s Life”). His sister is also a famous Egyptian actress, Sherihan Ahmed Abd El Fatah al-Shalakani.
In 1972, he moved to Lebanon where he recorded a handful of solo albums. He returned to Egypt after the civil war began in Lebanon in 1975. Upon his return, he starred in “Hata Akher El-Omr” (“Until The End of Lifetime”) along with Nagwa Ibrahim and Mahmoud Abdel-Aziz.
Omar delivered his most noted performance opposite Madiha Kamel in “El-Arrafa” (“The Fortuneteller”) in 1981. He played a police officer who sympathizes with a student arrested for her political opinions. Two months after the critical acclaim and box-office success of the film, Khorshid was killed in a car accident. One of the more popular rumors was that he was having an affair with a married woman whose husband arranged the accident.
As of March 2007, actor and singer Sameh Youssry is trying to convince members of Omar Khorshid’s family to authorize a biographical movie in which Youssry would star.
The fact that there is not a shrine (or at least a website) dedicated to the man is a mystery. He does not even have a listing on Wikipedia. What little of his solo recordings that are in print and available on compact disc are not exactly his best material, but are will still worth tracking down.
There is also a posting on Waxidermy for this album and Volume 2.
Catalog number VLMX 87 Voix de l’Orient series for A. Chahine & Fils in Lebanon, manufactured and distributed by EMI of Greece, 1978.
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Since the initial posting of this article, Hany Zaki has started work on a website dedicated to Omar Khorshid.
Filed under: Zambia
The Ngozi Family were from Zambia.
The Republic of Zambia, which had previously been called Northern Rhodesia, was founded in 1964. The country had seceded from part of the British controlled Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland, which had joined Northern and Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) with Nyasaland (now Malawi).
The band started in 1975, and was lead by Paul Dobson Nyirongo (a.k.a. Paul Ngozi) who was know for his spectacular stage antics, that included playing the guitar with his teeth. They were the first band to have been called ‘Zamrock’.
Paul Ngozi was adored by Zambian music lovers. His music is also best remembered for his poignant lyrics that reflected the life and times of Zambians. He won many awards and represented Zambian music in both Europe and the United States, and even went on a controversial tour of South Africa at the height of the Apartheid Era.
Catalog number Ngozi-5 ZMPC-41 on A.I.T. Records of Kenya. No release date given.
Filed under: Taiwan
♬ (Wishing You) Well In The New Year
Teresa Teng was from Tienyang, Taiwan.
The main island of Taiwan, also known as Formosa, is located in East Asia off the coast of mainland China, southwest of the main islands of Japan but directly west of the end of Japan’s Ryukyu Islands, and north-northwest of the Philippines.
Teresa Teng was born Deng Lijun in Tienyang, a village in Yunlin County, to a mainlander family originating from Hebei province. She was educated at Ginling Girls High School.
In 1968, she became famous after giving a performance on a popular music programme in Taiwan, and released eight albums within the next two years. In 1973, she attempted to crack the Japanese market, taking part in Japan’s Kōhaku Uta Gassen, a year-round singing match of the most successful artists of that year, and won the prize for “Best New Singing Star”.
In 1974, with the song “Airport” (空港), she conquered Japan, where she remained a leading star despite a short exile in 1979 when she was deported for having entered on a fake Indonesian passport, bought for $20,000, a deception rendered necessary by a break in relations between Taiwan and Japan on China’s entry to the UN Security Council. Singing by now in Cantonese, Japanese and English as well as her native Mandarin, Teng was soon popular as far as Malaysia and Indonesia.
She was well known and her music was also hugely popular in mainland China despite the fact that the authorities had branded most Western music, including her music, as “decadent”. However, she was never to perform there. She performed in Paris during the 1989 Tiananmen student uprising, singing for the students and proclaiming her support for them and for democracy..
Teng died from a severe asthma attack while on holiday in Chiang Mai, Thailand at the age of 42 (43 by Chinese reckoning) on May 8, 1995. She is buried in a mountainside tomb at Chin Pao San (金寶山; translates to Golden Treasure Mountain), a cemetery near Jinshan, Taipei County in Taiwan. A memorial was built at the tomb with a statue of Teng and her stage clothes on display, with her music playing in the background. There is also a large electronic piano keyboard that visitors can play by stepping on the keys.
Thanks to Ho Chui-wa for tanslating the titles.
Catalog number LFEP 3102 on Life Records of Singapore. No release date listed.
Filed under: Singapore
I can’t tell you that much about The Tropicano, except that they were from Singapore. This is the only single that I have seen by them. If you have any information, please contact me.
In 2003, Singapore’s Media Development Authority (MDA) commissioned a six-part series documentary for televison on the Singapore music scene from the 1960s to the present day, entitled Jammin’. If anyone knows how I could get a copy of that documentary (especially the first two episodes), I would greatly appreciate it.
Catalog number NFEP – 5012 on Play Boy label, which belonged to the Ngee Fat Record Company of Singapore. No date listed.
Filed under: Turkmenistan
Ƨyнeɯ Вокально–Инструментальньıй Ансамбль, or Gunesh Vocal Ensemble Instrumental Experience, were from Turkmenistan.
Turkmenistan (also known as Turkmenia) is a Turkic country in Central Asia. The name Turkmenistan is derived from Persian, meaning “land of the Turkmen“. Its capital is Ashgabat derived from Persian, as well, loosely translates as “the city of love.”. Until 1991, it was a constituent republic of the Soviet Union, the Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republic. It is bordered by Afghanistan to the southeast, Iran to the southwest, Uzbekistan to the northeast, Kazakhstan to the northwest, and the Caspian Sea to the west. Eighty-seven percent of the population is Muslim.
Russia gained control of Turkmenistan in 1894, and incorporated it into its empire. Then after the October Revolution of 1917 in Russia and subsequent political unrest led to the declaration of the area as the Turkmen SSR, one of the six republics of the Soviet Union in 1924, assuming the borders of modern Turkmenistan.
The new Turkmen SSR went through a process of further ‘Europeanization’. The tribal Turkmen people were encouraged to become secular and adopt European-style clothing. The Turkmen alphabet was changed from the traditional Arabic script to Latin and finally to Cyrillic.
Gunesh formed in 1970 as part of State TV and Radio Company of the Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republic as a “vocal group with supporting instruments”.
According to their website, “The group began to play jazz-rock tightly intertwined with the Oriental tradition. Gunesh’ has always been in the process of reforming and was one of the first combine the similar principles of the melodious improvisation on traditional mugams and jazz improvisation. The unexpectedly beautiful arrangements appeared, and polyrhythmic compositions with odd measure were further developed thematically.”
From the best that I can tell, they relocated to Tbilisi, Georgia in the late Seventies or early Eighties. They recorded two albums, their debut was released in 1980 and the second “Looking at the Earth” in 1984. They toured extensively in the Eastern Bloc, as well as Afghanistan, Cape Verde, China, Guinea-Bissau, Laos, Mongolia, Mozambique, Senegal, Turkey and Vietnam. These two songs are from a flexi disc (one of two they were split with ABBA on the other side) that were released before their first album.
I e-mailed Stanislav Morozov thru his website, but he did not respond.
Catalog number Г 62-07335-6 TУ 43-03-48-73 on the Soviet state-owned and operated Μелодия (Melodiya) label. No release date listed.
Filed under: Ethiopia
Alèmayehu Eshété was from Ethiopia.
If one were to pick a specific point that marked the birth of the distinctive Ethiopian soul music, one could do worse than choose the late Emperor Haile Sellassie’s visit to Jerusalem in 1923. During his stay he heard European brass instruments, which made such an impression on him that he hired a group of Armenian players to become official musicians of the empire. One of these players, Kevork Nalbandian, even composed the current Ethiopian National Anthem in 1926 (Although, according to Wikipedia, it was Solomon Lulu Mitiku).
Thus a distinctly European flavour of brass band music was brought into a country whose traditional music bore heavy influence from Muslim forms, and its own modal pentatonic scale. Additionally, because it was actually impossible to buy saxophones, drums or other musical instruments under the Selassie regime, only the marching bands had access to them, giving the subsequently played music a foreboding, militaristic ambience.
Meanwhile in Europe, a new generation became that baby boomers started the cultural revolution of rock ’n’ roll, R ’n’ B and pop music in the 1960s. The same generation in Ethiopia, in their 20s during the early 60s, wanted to change the country and get connected with the world. But where Ethiopia was different was that they had about 6,000 Peace Corps from America. President Kennedy invented this civil service for youngsters in order to work in third world countries, so these people brought with them a lot of American flavours: long hair, bell-bottom trousers and plenty of vinyl records.
Thanks to the newly acquired influences from the West, the sound emanating from the clubs Addis Ababa was a heady stew of deep, hypnotic rhythms, distinctly Western guitar licks and soulful eastern melodies and vocals. The sound bore the unmistakable badge of American records (Stax and Motown artists in particular) plus something distinctly African and new.
Soon labels such as Amha Records and Kaifa Records sprung up around the city to capture the sounds produced by the more popular singers and performers. Mahmoud Ahmed, Mulatu Astatke, Tlahoun Gèssèssè, as well as others all brought their soulful sound to the clubs and cut records.
The Alem-Girma band was formed by Alèmayehu Eshété and Girma Beyene in 1972. Both supposedly shared the taste of music and clothing fashion that was coming from the United States (James Brown, Elvis Presley, and Wilson Pickett to name a few). The band retained some of the members from the All Star Band. From left to right: Tekle “Huket” Adhanom (guitar), Tamerat “Lotti” Kebede (drums), Alemayehu Eshete (vocals), Girma Beyene (piano and arranger) & Tekle Gebremariam (sax). The band lasted until 1974, after Colonel Mengistu Haile Mariam’s military coup against Selassie. Under Mariam’s Derg, or ruling council, Addis Ababa’s nightlife died off.
Volume 9 of the Ethiopiques series is devoted to Alèmayehu Eshété’s earlier music, while Volume 22 of that series covers his career between 1972 and 1974. Some of his songs have also appeared on volumes 3, 8, 10, and 13. Also, L’Arôme, in association with Buda Musique, has recently released a vinyl only collection of some of his best tracks, entitled Ethiopian Urban Modern Music Vol 2. He still active in Ethiopia performing and recording to this day.
Catalog Number PH 172 on Philips, “manufactured by E. A. Records for Phonogram in E. Africa”. Publishing date listed as 1973.
Filed under: Israel
The Fat & The Thin were from Israel.
Israel (Hebrew: יִשְׂרָאֵל), is located on the southeastern edge of the Mediterranean Sea. It borders with Lebanon in the north, Syria and Jordan in the east, and Egypt on the southwest, and contains geographically diverse features within its relatively small area. The West Bank and Gaza Strip, which are partially administrated by the Palestinian National Authority, are also adjacent. With a population of about 7.2 million, the majority of whom are Jews, Israel is the world’s only Jewish state. It is also home to Arab Muslims, Christians and Druze, as well as other religious and ethnic minority groups. Jerusalem is the nation’s capital, seat of government, and largest city.
The modern state of Israel has its roots in the Land of Israel, a concept central to Judaism for over three thousand years. After World War I, the League of Nations approved the British Mandate for Palestine with the intent of creating a “national home for the Jewish people”. In 1947, the United Nations approved the partition of the Mandate of Palestine into two states, one Jewish and one Arab. The Arab League rejected the plan, but on May 14, 1948, Israel declared its independence. The new country’s victory in the subsequent Arab-Israeli War expanded the borders of the Jewish state beyond those in the UN Partition Plan. Since then, Israel has been in conflict with many of the neighboring Arab countries, resulting in several major wars and decades of violence. Throughout the conflict, Israel’s boundaries have been subject to dispute, although Israel has signed peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan, and efforts are being made to reach a permanent accord with the Palestinians.
Uzi Fuchs (a.k.a. Uzi Fux) sang on this song, while Watson T. Browne provided the vocals on the A side. Uzi would later go on to form Uzi & The Styles, while Watson T. Browne would go on to a solo career in various countries across Europe . The only other information that I have been able to find, is that they recorded a a song called “I’m A Travelin’ Man” that was included on the second volume of the “Conquer the World” compilation.
Catalog number 45-604 Hed Artzi (which translates to ‘The Echo of My Country’) of Tel Aviv, Israel. No release date given.
Filed under: Vietnam
Elvis Phương was from Vietnam.
Records from Vietnam are rare, at best. And usually, I am unable to find hardly any information about music (outside of tradtional folk music) in that country before the Eighties. But, I was surprised to find a biography on Elvis Phương:
Elvis learned to sing by listening to the records or tapes of foreign singers. When he was 17 or 18 years old, against his father wishes, Elvis Phương chose to stay in Vietnam to pursue a career in singing instead of going to France for an education. Elvis Phương, whose real name is Pham Ngoc Phương selected his stage name after his idol, Elvis Presley.
His first appearance in front of an audience was in 1962 at Regina Pacis high school’s open house where he sang Nua Dem Ngoai Pho and O’ Cangaceiro. The first band that he worked with was the Rockin’ Stars, a popular band during the early 60s. In subsequent years, he also collaborated with other famous bands such as Les Vampires and Phương Hoàng. In 1968, Mr. Ngoc Chanh of Shotguns Productions produced Elvis Phương’s first album titled Shotguns 26: Tieng Hat Elvis Phương. In 1977, Elvis Phương’s musical journey took him by storm with the first album produced overseas titled Hat Cho Nguoi Vuot Bien. Since then, Elvis Phương has recorded many tapes and / or CDs and appeared in many videos.
He currently lives in Cerritos, California, where he runs EP Productions. He also has a website (that is under construction). And, apparently he is an Aquarius (his birthday on February 1st), his favorite color is black & white and his lucky number is thirteen.
There is a separate catalog number for each song on this record… The catalog number for this song is GP • 1287 31 3 7 on Dưâm Records of Vietnam. No release date given.
Filed under: Cape Verde
While all of the members of Voz De Cabo Verde were originally from tiny island nation of Cape Verde, the band actually formed in Rotterdam, in the Netherlands in 1966. Although, I have also read that the band may have originally formed in Dakar, Senegal before relocating to the Netherlands.
The original line up consisted of Luis Morais (saxophone, clarinet), Morgadinho (trumpet, vocals, bass guitar), Franck Cavaquinho (drums), Toy Ramos (guitar), Jean da Lomba (bass guitar). The singer Djosinha joined the group in 1967, then pianiste–organist Chico Serra in early 1968.
For four years, the group was based in Rotterdam, but they toured regularly in the Benelux countries, France, Portugal, and America. They also played in many of the Portuguese speaking countries of Africa, including several tours in Cape Verde.
Le groupe se sépare en 1970.The group broke up in 1970, but reformed in 2002 with the original members (except Cavaquinho Frank died a few years earlier) in Lisbon, Portugal. This only lasted a few months, before Luis Morais turned up missing.
Catalog number 113 482 F on their own Voz De Cabo Verde label. No other information is available.
Filed under: Pakistan
♬ Bhavayia
The Silhouettes were from Pakistan.
The name “Pakistan” means “Land of the Pure” in Urdu, as well as in Persian. It was coined in 1934 as “Pakstan” by Choudhary Rahmat Ali, who published it in the pamphlet Now or Never. The name represented, according to Ali, the “thirty million Muslims of PAKSTAN, who live in the five Northern Units of (British) India – Punjab, North-West Frontier Province. (a.k.a. Afghania), Kashmir, Sindh, and Balochistan.” The nation was founded officially as the Dominion of Pakistan in 1947 after the Partition of India, and was renamed the Islamic Republic of Pakistan in 1956.
Apparently, there was a market for traditional music played on Western instruments. Not sure who this was being marketed to, either the indigenous population or foreign tourists. But there were a number of bands that released similar records, most notable being The Fore Thoughts, The Mods and The Panthers.
Here are the liner notes:
In your hands, is the first ever stereo long playing album recorded and manufactured in Pakistan.
We present to you a top, pop local group, ‘THE SILHOUETTES’. These brilliant young contemporary musicians play tunes, some of which are folk, and were written before they were born, in such an original way as to give these melodies a new concept.
We have called the L.P. ‘THE SOUND OF THE SILHOUETTES’, mainly because we could not think of a more apt title. You will enjoy listening to the scintillating rhythms, the unique combinations of Guitar and Electric Sitar in SOFT SILHOUETTES and BHAWAIYA, the ingenious blending of vibraphone and Electric Sitar. In SOUND OF THE SILHOUETTES, you will also listen to classical numbers like RAGA AMEN and PEELO which they have played with gusto and perfection.
Versatility is a strong point of THE SILHOUETTES. In addition to featuring exciting folk tunes, they also make a point of featuring some of their own compositions in meticulous execution.
With “MAIN DIVANA” and their great performance of “SOUND OF THE SILHOUETTES” the Silhouettes are sure to become the most popular entertaining group for a long time to come.
The Silhouettes did release one other single, as the backing band for Runa and Dina Laila. But as far as I know, that was it. As for their record label, which is the only record I have seen from the region that was not on some version of EMI / HMV / RCA, Arokey Chemical Industries was taken over by the Pakistani government in 1972.
Catalog number ACI.S-I on Arokey-Records, “A product of Arokey Chemical Industries, Ltd. 3rd Floor, N.G.B. McLeod Road, Karachi”. No release date listed.
Radiodiffusion Internasionaal Annexe 