Key Factors
- A era of ladies are shaking up Egypt’s underground digital music scene.
- The music trade stays male-dominated in Egypt. Its cultural institution marginalises digital music artists.
- Younger ladies DJs are in search of to create extra inclusive areas for performers and party-goers alike.
Laser beams illuminate a darkened restaurant-turned-dance corridor in Cairo as revellers transfer to thumping beats from feminine DJs – a part of a era of ladies shaking up Egypt’s underground digital music scene.
“All my life, I’ve seen males behind the decks,” mentioned party-goer Menna Shanab, 26, as psychedelic visuals mirrored off the waters on the Nile-side venue.
“It is good to see the music scene evolving,” mentioned the younger Cairo resident, decked out in trendy streetwear.
In Egypt’s patriarchal society, the music trade stays male-dominated, whereas the conservative nation’s cultural institution marginalises and even bans digital music artists.
Feminine party-goers for years have complained about harassment on the dance ground, whereas many revellers discover mainstream venues too dear.
Now, a era of younger ladies DJs are forging their very own path, in search of to create extra inclusive areas for performers and party-goers alike.
Egyptian DJ Yas Meen Selectress performs music at a restaurant-turned-dance-hall in Egypt’s capital Cairo on 10 September, 2022. In Egypt’s patriarchal society, the music trade stays male-dominated, whereas the conservative nation’s cultural institution marginalises and even bans digital music artists. Supply: Getty, AFP / Khaled Desouki
A small however vibrant digital music scene is “booming” within the Egyptian capital, in accordance Yemeni music journalist and occasional DJ Hala Okay, asking like others information company AFP interviewed to be recognized solely by her stage identify.
“Loads of feminine skills really feel extra assured and empowered to pursue DJing,” the Amsterdam-based Hala Okay mentioned by phone.
Aspiring artists are taking inspiration from feminine DJs from the area, she added, akin to Palestinian Sama Abdulhadi, who has carried out from Egypt to France and at premier United States competition, Coachella.
In Cairo, there are “highly effective, gifted ladies on the turntables: they know the way to make folks dance”, Hala Okay mentioned.
‘Occasion in peace’
DJ and promoter A7ba-L-Jelly determined to ascertain her personal collective as a part of making the underground digital dance music scene extra inclusive.
“I needed to organise occasions the place I’d really feel protected myself, with out harassment,” mentioned the 32-year-old.
“I simply needed to go and get together in peace.”
Greater than 90 per cent of ladies in Egypt aged between 18 and 39 mentioned in 2019 that that they had skilled some type of sexual harassment, in response to the Arab Barometer public opinion analysis community.
“In some locations in Egypt, the place they play extra industrial music… you will not enter since you are single, or since you do not look wealthy sufficient,” A7ba-L-Jelly added.
“I ebook female and male DJs to create dance flooring which can be inclusive when it comes to music, gender and social class,” she mentioned.
From the Nile-side dance venue, DJ Yas Meen Selectress complained that no matter gender, “there aren’t any devoted areas for us the place we will play our music”.
Places are sometimes gardens or different makeshift websites, organisers advised AFP.
“Traditions, society and different elements imply that there are fewer ladies than males within the scene,” Yas Meen Selectress added.
Lower than 20 per cent of ladies are formally employed within the nation of 104 million.
Egyptian DJ Yas Meen Selectress mentioned that no matter gender, “there aren’t any devoted areas for us the place we will play our music”. Supply: Getty / KHALED DESOUKI/AFP
For the DJ in her late 20s, who lives between Cairo and New York, nevertheless, “to be solely outlined by one’s gender is reductive”.
For others like Dalia Hassan, it’s a promoting level.
Over the previous 20 years, she has made a reputation for herself taking part in at women-only occasions from Cairo to the Yemeni capital Sanaa and Riyadh in Saudi Arabia.
Ms Hassan mentioned she DJs at bachelorette events, gender-segregated weddings and anyplace a feminine viewers desires to “dress up and dance as they please”.
‘Dominated by males’
For France-based researcher Hajer Ben Boubaker, the shortage of ladies DJs runs counter to Egypt’s robust custom of ladies performers.
“Feminine singers have at all times been effectively represented within the Arab cultural scene,” she advised AFP.
“The image par excellence of Egyptian music remains to be the legendary Umm Kalthoum,” she added, referring to the Twentieth-century diva revered across the Arab world.
However “ladies are barely represented within the Egyptian electro scene of mahraganat, which is the preferred music at this time,” she added.
Mahraganat depends closely on computer-generated and synthesised beats and options blunt lyrics that sort out matters together with love, energy and cash.
The nation’s musicians’ union introduced late final yr it was abolishing the style as a part of a marketing campaign to “protect public style”.
Frederike Berje from Germany’s Goethe-Institut in Cairo famous that Egypt’s “music trade, particularly the digital scene, is closely depending on personal initiatives and the dedication of particular person artists”.
Regardless of rising numbers of ladies DJs, nevertheless, it “stays dominated by males – particularly in relation to manufacturing and administration”, she added.
