Hamza el Din

Hamza El Din ,乌德琴和Tar演奏大师, 现代努比亚音乐之父,是最早获得广泛世界承认的非洲音乐家之一..他出生于埃及努比亚地区的Toshka, 最初在埃及开罗学习机械，但对乌德琴情有独钟，后来索性放弃工作到开罗音乐学院潜心学习音乐.并开始自己创作音乐. 但有感于当时埃及普遍压抑的政治与社会气氛,决定到苏丹寻求更自由开放的艺术环境，当时许多努比亚人在苏丹产生巨大的文化影响. 1959年,他l来到意大利继续深造音乐,在罗马Santa Cecilia学院学习西方音乐和古典吉他. 正是在那时候,遇到美国人Gino Foreman,他向Joan Baez 和 Bob Dylan推荐Hamza.这使他拿到了Vanguard公司的一纸合同,在六十年代中期,他在其旗下出版了Al Oud — Instrumental and Vocal Music From Nubia,这也是最早在西方广泛流行的worldmusic之一. 西方听众同时也在舞台上认识这位来自努比亚的音乐艺人,他与Grateful Dead合作,经常为他们演出做伴奏. El Din其后也协助Grateful Dead在埃及进行巡回演出.他被认为最为优秀的专辑Eclipse,正是由Grateful Dead的鼓手Mickey Hart参与制作的. 六十年代末期开始,他大部份时间居住在美国.在那他作为一个职业演奏家奔走于录音室,音乐会之间,他同时也在大学里教授人种音乐学,包括俄亥俄州大学,华盛顿大学,德克萨斯大学等.80年代,得到日本的基金赞助,到东京进行阿拉伯乌德琴和日本摩萨琵琶的比较学研究. 目前Hamza El Din居住在旧金山,继续忙碌于创作,教学,录音,并在全球各地进行频繁表演 ,身影经常出现在世界主要的音乐节上,包括了爱丁堡,维也纳,巴黎,柏林,巴塞罗纳,洛城,蒙特利尔等等…. Hamza与Kronos Quartet也保持着良好的合作关系,. 曾替Kronos Quartet作曲,同时Kronos Quartet也参与了Hamza的音乐制作. Hamza'的音乐经常出现在电影soundtrack里,其中包括了Black Stallion(黑神驹),The Passion in the Desert…. Hamza的一些创作作品同时还被很多芭蕾舞乐团采用. Hamza弹奏的乌德琴,泛音丰富,敏感而精微,但毫不拘束,韵律平滑而张力十足.他展现一种新的音乐形式,运用阿拉伯古典音乐的技巧和美学构造,勾画出努比亚音乐的色泽和灵魂.但这并不是一种松散的融合,而是一种新的完全的表达形式.具有显着意义的是他运用一切乌德琴的技术特性与新的音乐范式和理念充分结合,从而使之相对于努比亚传统的人声演唱和鼓乐而独立发展.这种真正意义上的融合是建立在良好的传统音乐和现代西方当代音乐训练基础下的. 他用飞扬的歌词,远古努比亚的语言,低沉的乌德琴声,相互萦绕使听者进入努比亚人的精神家园.1968年在Nonesuch下发表的Escalay被认为是努比亚音乐最好的范本之一.
One of the first African musicians to gain widespread international recognition, Hamza El Din is a Nubian master of the oud, or the fretless lute. Western listeners are as likely as not to have been exposed to his work via the Grateful Dead, who played with him on-stage occasionally. (El Din also helped arrange the Deads tour of Egypt.) He played an integral role in modernizing Nubian music, using his work to both evoke and tell stories of Nubian life.
El Din was originally trained to be an engineer, but changed direction and enrolled in the Middle Eastern School of Music, where he began to compose his own songs. On a fellowship to study Western classical music in Rome, he met American Gino Foreman, who exposed Hamzas work to Joan Baez and Bob Dylan. This resulted in a contract with Vanguard. His mid-60s debut, Al Oud — Instrumental and Vocal Music From Nubia, was one of the first world music recordings to achieve wide exposure in the West.
In the second half of the 1960s, El Din spent much of his time in America, living in guitarist Sandy Bulls apartment for a while. Taking a series of teaching positions in various American locations, he also found time to record a Nonesuch album in 1968, Escalay, that is considered one of the best s of Nubian music. Eclipse is his most notable post-Escalay record, raising his profile in the U.S. when it was reissued on CD by Rykodisc.