Hamra Street will migrate to Beiteddine for a few days later this month. Just as August’s heat and humidity plot against Ras Beirutis who couldn’t afford to relocate someplace cooler, Metro al-Madina’s brand-new cabaret show, “Bar Farouq,” will stage its three opening shows at the Beiteddine Art Festival. The show promises to be in much the same spirit as “Hishik Bishik” – Metro’s homage to the profane musical culture of early 20th-century Egypt, which after two and a half years is still playing to full houses.
“Bar Farouq” too will feature a fair-sized ensemble of performers, 13 in all – mostly “Hishik Bishik” veterans, with a few fresh young talents added. Though the show will be staged at Beiteddine’s more intimate inner courtyard, the audience capacity will be a bit larger than that of Metro al-Madina.
“I think it sits maybe 900 people,” ruminates Hisham Jaber, Metro al-Madina founder and sometime master of ceremonies.
“All three nights are fully booked, so they’ve added extra rows of seating,” Jaber laughs. “So the stress is bubbling.”
“Bar Farouq” strolls through the world of 20th-century Beiruti music. The show’s title is borrowed from two Beirut entertainment venues.
At the end of the 19th century, when Beirut was still an Ottoman provincial capital, there was a theater called Masrah Zaharat Suriya, the Rose of Syria Theater.
“At that time Beirut was called Zaharat Suriya,” Jaber says. “Someone from Beit Krediyya had a good relationship with the Ottoman officials. During World War I, the army took over the theater.
“It reopened for a few years after World War II. Then the Kredis opened it again under the name Masrah Farouq, after Egypt’s King Farouq. When [Egyptian President Gamal] Abdel-Nasser came, they named it Masrah Tahrir, but people knew it as Masrah Farouq.
“Performers came from all over. Egyptian, Iraqi, Syrian and all the Lebanese artists performed there,” Jaber says. “They say it was because this theater [was so successful that] many other theaters in the downtown became cinemas.
“In the later 1960s, Masrah Farouq became a “terso” theater – that’s an old expression for something low, exotic and sexy, just for money. In a way it became a cabaret. Then at the beginning of the ’70s it burned down. There is also a Bar Farouq in Hamra, with prostitution and so on. This inspired us to create a show called ‘Bar Farouq’ [as a way] to talk about Lebanon, especially Beirut, from the ’30s to the beginning of the Lebanese [Civil] War.”
The show has no narrative, Jaber says, but by performing music from three eras of urban history – ’30s-’40s, ’50s-’60s and ’60s-’70s – the show will reflect something of the spirit of the place.
“Bar Farouq is in Sahet al-Burj, on the street, and you can see the whole city from its windows. So [for this show] we’re rebuilding this city in 3-D, and the are people coming and going.”
Jaber is visibly excited about the playlist he and his collaborators have assembled, comprised of 29 tunes – five original numbers composed by Jaber and arranged by Ziad al-Ahmadiye and 24 tunes from the archives.
“We know something about some of these artists, [others] we know nothing about at all, but they created the Beiruti song, the song of the city.”
It’s Jaber’s interest in Lebanon’s repertoire of urban songs that’s really driving this show.
“This is what we’re working on ... the music the city formed before the mountain came to the city. After the mountain came to the city, we were told ‘This is Lebanese song,’ out of nowhere.
“OK, this is Lebanese song from the mountain and they are beautiful and nice but it’s not the identity of all of Lebanon. We also have songs made in the city of Beirut.”
This program of urban music samples works by such composers and vocalists as Omar Al Zaani, Sami al-Sidawi, Mohammad Osman, the Rahbani brothers, Philemon Wehbe, Ferial Karim, Sabah, Wadad, Kahraman, Najah Salam, Sabah Fakhri and Mai Yazbek.
Musically speaking there’s very little difference between the songs of the mountain and those of the city, Jaber says, with Beirut musicians working with the standard maqamaat and rhythms. The difference could be heard in the lyrics.
“In the 1950s, when other female vocalists were singing about waiting for their lovers and how they’re so f+++ed up and ‘Oh hit me, hit me,’” Jaber laughs, “there were Wadad’s songs ... In ‘Bi Tindam’ [You’ll Regret], composed by Sami Sidawi, she threatens her lover. ‘If you do this, OK, I’ll do this.’ There’s another song, ‘Btkin, kin. If you do that I will do the same. If you’re crazy, I’ll be crazy’
“The thinking in these poems, they emerged from a city. Also in the ’50s and ’60s, the Nasseri stuff came, elevating women to another level. The city had other songs, other mentalities. You can really hear it in the songs sung by women, and the way men sing to women.”
Jaber says the program for “Bar Farouq” emerged from nine or 10 months of intermittent research.
“It’s as well-researched as sources allow,” he says, “because the archiving is really shit man. There’s nothing.
“You’ll find Beirut and the feeling of Beirut [in this show],” he says, then laughs. “But it’s not a research paper. It’s entertainment.”
“Bar Farouq” will be staged at Beiteddine Palace Aug. 20-22 at 8:30 p.m.
By Jim Quilty
