05.31.06
Blessed Be, Hamza el Din
In case you had not heard, Hamza el Din, the great Nubian oud player and composer, died May 22, 2006 in Berkeley, CA. He was 76 years old. According to his wife, the cause was complications following surgery for a gall bladder infection.
The last album of his to be released was A Wish (1999, Sounds True), but his wife told the NY Times that he had recently finished recording a new album.
I have been a great fan of Hamza’s beautiful, gentle, and haunting music since I first heard his piece “Mwashah” on the 1991 RykoDisc compilation, Around the World (for a Song), a reduced-price collection intended to promote the extensive series of Ryko world music releases produced and beautifully recorded by Mickey Hart. A deceptively simple and spare combination of tar (frame drum), hand claps, and oud, “Mwashah” rose out of the compilation like mists at dawn — a gentle cloud of dreamed rememberance drifting at dawn across the soul, at once melancholic and peacefully ecstatic. Though so poor that I could only afford cut-rate compilations, I went without a couple-three meals and sought out more recordings by this obvious master. Soon, I became aware that his name and music was a kind of password among a certain Chicago group of musicians and mystics. It wasn’t a clique or a club or anything like that. It was a brotherhood that welcomed you, a special smile among friends.
Only much later did I learn that the transformative moment in Hamza’s life was when the Aswan High Dam in Egypt was erected, forever flooding his home town. Coincidentally, when I was a young grammar school student in Indianapolis I had done a class presentation about the Aswan Dam and the massive effort that moved and saved the enormous ancient Egyptian twin temples of Abu Simbel. Another coincidence is that for a time he taught here in Seattle, at the University of Washington. It was merely a stone’s throw from the UW campus that I had the great pleasure of seeing him perform live for the only time. It was in the chapel of a Methodist church, and the US invasion of Iraq was in the air. In a strange way, nothing could have been more fitting.
What can I say? I am deeply saddened by his passing. His music, particularly the album Eclipse (1982, RykoDisc), has been an emotional touchstone for me for much of my adult life. The very same pieces of music have consoled me during times of deep pain and sadness, soared with me during times of happiness and peace, calmed me during times of turmoil, and been a gift to friends and family alike who are inevitably moved by them much as I have been. That, surely, is the mark of a great artist and spirit.
Thank you, Hamza.
Video: Hamza introducing and performing “Helalisa,” later released on the album Eclipse. Via YouTube. Filmed in Seattle, WA in 1970 by Robert Garfias.
MP3: “The Water Wheel” (30 mb), from the landmark album Escalay (The Water Wheel) (1971, Nonesuch Explorer). Via Gramosongs.com.
Tips of the hat to George Sundell (aka Dad) for passing the sad news to me, and to Alan Bishop for passing along the YouTube clip.
