Palestine has recently witnessed a number of concerts and cultural features in the memory of the late singer and musician Farid al Atrash, while the Israeli press assailed the artist labeling him as “corrupted.”
Singer Maya Casabianka, of Moroccan origin, who was involved in love with the late singer and remained faithful to him until his death in 1974, sang in the cities of Daliat al Karmel and Shafa Amr, said the daily al Hayat adding that the presence of the singer came as a surprise as she stays in Haifa.
The paper cited the singer as saying that she still remembers the late artist with love and that no love between a woman and a man can match her love to Farid.
Earlier the cultural centers in Daliat al Karmel announced that they would donate financial prizes each of which amounting to 3000 dollars for the best player of Farid’s cadences.
In Java, local singing troupes took part in the commemoration and an audience mostly from old people who were contemporary with the late singer’s songs attended the occasion. Had the Arab Israeli relations been normal, a large number of eastern Jews would have attended.
On the other hand, the Israeli local papers assailed al Atrash in an editorial eight months ago minimizing his role in Arab singing parade and labeling him as “was corrupted.” The papers alleged that the French Academy interest in the late artist came as a result of “the French biased attitude in favor of the Arabs.” But the editorial was counteracted by the angry eastern Jews who look at al Atrash as the greatest contributor to art.
The weekly addendum of the Israeli daily Haartz wrote an editorial about al Atrash on his 25th death anniversary and another one on Umm Kulthoum on the occasion of inaugurating her museum recently in Cairo. The paper hailed both artists and their contribution to the art of Arab singing which “has its impacts on the most prominent eastern Jew singers in Israel.”
However, the Israeli music academies adopted a theory confirming the impacts of Arab and European singing on the Israeli singing and that “the latter does not have its own foundation as the Arab singing art does.” -- Albawaba.com
