Singer and poet Aziza Brahim comes to Fasching with her desert blues loaded with sadness and hope.
Aziza Brahim belongs to Western Sahara’s indigenous Sahrawi population and grew up in a refugee camp in the Algerian desert along with thousands of others who were forced to leave their homes in Western Sahara.
Inspired by her grandmother, she started singing and playing music as a little girl. Already at the age of eleven, she had the opportunity to study in Cuba, and was impressed by the rhythms and melodies that can still be felt in her music today.
As she eventually toured internationally, the memories and experience of refugee life became a recurring theme in Aziza Brahim’s melancholic music.
Aziza plays the Sharawi traditional hand drum called tabal. She sings in Hassaniya Arabic and in Spanish about the injustices experienced by the people in the camps – not only those from Western Sahara but all the millions of refugees around the world. The music has kinship with other desert blues bands such as Tinariwen and Tamikrest but also has many other threads to blues rock and Jamaican and Cuban rhythms.
Early this year, her sixth full-length Mawja was released, where DN noted: “It’s a wonder she’s not bigger than she is.”
Aziza Maichan – voice + tabal
Guillem Aguilar – bass
Ignasi Cusso – guitar
Andreu Moreno – drums
