IN "ARABY" WORLD

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 36, 13 February 1933, Page 11

IN "ARABY" WORLD

SINGER AND CHORUS

The Melba of the Arabic world, Miss Urn Kalthum, has recently been singing in Badgad, states an exchange. She- brought her own band and

"chorus" of eight musicians, and received a fee of £.150 for each night. Her programme with intervals lasted about three hours.

, Her voice is under marvellous control, although she sings in a style quite different from that taught in European schools. She does not "produce," but sings from the throat and chest. . Her whole performance, as well as that of the orchestra, appears to lack the dynamic force of Western music, but there.are subtle nuances and changes of mood which are pregnant with emotion. ,

It is difficult for a European not conversant with Eastern music to under-

stand it, but the first impression it made /Wa9 by its queer rhythms. It seems a very free music, five, seven and nine rhythms follow one another, in quick succession. There is very little' harmony as we understand it, and it certainly does not fall into the diatonic scale.

Her gramophone records have a great VOgue from Morocco to as far as Central Asia, and her first appearance in person was received with great acclamation, if, She is & strikingly handsome woman of about ?6 years. She wears a simple black dress, trimmed with sequins and a black band around her hair, and her personality dominates her^audience.

Her audiences have been extremely appreciative. They have embraced all ranks of society from Cabinet Ministers and the Lord Mayor downwards, and whether Effendi in European dress or desert Arab in flowing robes, all have responded immediately to her dramatic singing.