Dove's Eye View

Scraperbikes

Local kids - two miles from my house - turn old bikes into colorful showpieces; they do tricks and parade around in formation. The song lyric says "don't need no car"; they make bicycles into a pop culture phenomenon.

I need a new category called "My Oakland": Local scraperbikes ride into global consciousness. From the Oakland Tribune.

The video shows the intersection of High Street and Foothill - about two miles southwest of my house. Last year I was driving on 35th Avenue at Foothill when I saw a Latino youth on a three wheeled bike just like the ones in this video - decorated with metal foil and colorful paint. I rolled down my window as I waited at the stop light and spoke to him. "Did you build that yourself?" I shouted. "It's amazing. You could sell it for a lot of money! Great job!" The young man looked a little bewildered - middle-aged white ladies driving through East Oakland normally don't call out pleasantries from their cars to passing youth.

I had no idea this was a cultural movement in the making in my front yard. I don't "hang out" in that area much, usually just drive through on my way somewhere else, or pop in and out to visit a library branch or a friend, so I have only spotted the one scraper bike in real life.

This phenomenon is good for the planet (bikes, not cars; recycled materials), it's locally-grown, it's fun, it builds community and it features pop music. The Dove has always liked hip-hop since the late 70s in NYC, and I appreciate the high spirits and creativity of these young men - not only do they fix up bikes and careen around on them, they made a video and started a contest.

Update: Oakland Parks and Recreation Dept. has been offering Earn Your Bike since 1994 - where kids learn to fix up old bicycles, and upon completing the course earn their own bicycle to refurbish. Also several local recreation centers offer film and video courses. These scraper bike entrepreneurs could have gotten their skills at the local community center.

Go, Oakland!

Rare Clip: Lebanese Jewish Musician

From the Jews of Lebanon blog: Rare Clip: Lebanese Jewish Musician Haiim Moishe singing the hit that all my cousins sang and danced to at their weddings in the 80s. "Linda, Linda."

My question to my Arab readers - is he singing in a different accent/dialect? Because I don't understand the words in some places, and the accent sounds "different". My cousins told me this was originally an Iraqi song. (Update - no they didn't. I'm confusing this song with "Lela, lela") What's the scoop?

Resist Chaos, Resist Oppression: Play Music

An electronic hip-hop collective in Beirut will play two public concerts against the crisis - the intent seems to be to bring all sides together to enjoy music and resist the fragmentation, sectarianism and violence that is depressing Lebanon's vibrant society: UrShalim: "Anti-Crise" Musical Festival - An Invitation.

Hello everyone!

Our band "Hudna" or "Hudneh" or "Hedneh" - as you wish to pronounce it - shall be performing as part of the Anti-Crise event organized by INCONCERT.

Update - Revised dates, please note:

Friday 7-9-2007 Beirut- Sanayie Park 8:30 - 9:00 PM
Saturday 8-9-2007 Tyre Port -Tyre City 8:25 - 10:00 PM

We will present NEW songs of ours and other traditional songs that you love.
TELL YOUR FRIENDS AND BE THERE! :)

"In Concert" has the pleasure of inviting you to overthrow a political, educational, economical and presidential crisis by attending the "Anti-Crise" musical festival.
All concerts are free of charge and open to everybody without any discrimination. Your presence is very important to keep music culture alive in Lebanon.

Since I am merely an American of Lebanese origin, I am certainly missing any sectarian or political subtexts in this announcement, and may therefore offend somebody. Oh well, such is life amongst Lebanon's shifting alliances.

I support artists who take their art to the streets. Political leaders and military tacticians (irregular or governmental) think they can manipulate the people at will. It's true we don't have much power to prevent car bombs, aerial bombs, police state tactics or street-level thuggery - but we can show up to protest. We can show up to concerts. We can stand up for culture, for music, dance, film, visual art, poetry.

Make culture, not war.

Christian Composer Sets Islamic 99 Names to Music

From the New York Times: John Tavener - The Beautiful Names.

for Mr. Tavener to have written “The Beautiful Names,” a meditation on the 99 names of Allah, commissioned by no less than Prince Charles, for performance in a Roman Catholic cathedral does raise certain issues. For one, the charge of opportunism. For another, the risk that Muslims, who don’t exactly value music in worship, might not be appreciative.

I don't know why the Times has to pontificate on what 1.4 billion people might think of a piece of music. I just want you to read about this new work of art premiering in England.

Demagogues and politicians and egotists preach division. Artists and mystics reach for union. I throw my lot in with the artists and mystics, thank you.

Music And Literature Events

Saed Muhssin, Randa Jarrar, Mohja Kahf, Laila Lalami and Daniel Alarcón are all reading or performing somewhere in the next week, and they're all friends or teachers of mine. Daniel is the only non-Arab in this list but he's got the soul of an Arab so he's getting a mention.

Saed Muhssin, Arabic and Contemporary Music: Graduate Recital.
Saturday, April 28, Mills College Concert Hall, 8PM
Free admission.

The concert will include both classical Arabic and avant-garde/
experimental/ free improv/pan idiomatic music, improvised and composed, solo and ensemble.

Mohja Kahf and Randa Jarrar will read at the Stanford Bookstore on Tuesday, May 1, at 5:30 PM. Mohja is a fabulous poet and fiction writer who teaches comparative literature at U. Arkansas; Randa is a dynamic fiction writer with many story publications and a forthcoming novel.

Mohja Kahf is also reading at the Arab Cultural Center in San Francisco on Monday night, April 30, 6:30 p.m. See Mohja's books at left: the poetry collection Emails from Scheherazad and the debut novel Girl in a Tangerine Headscarf.

Laila Lalami, our own Moorish Girl, is returning from Morocco to sit on three panels at the Pen/Global Voices festival in New York City -- one on Wednesday 4/25 and two on Thursday 4/26. One of the Thursday panels is with Abdulrazak Gurnah. The other is with Pico Iyer and Neil Gaiman so it's a celebrity blow-out. Check her blog for details. Laila is the author of the novel about Moroccan immigrants titled Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits.

Daniel Alarcón is covered with glory this week - a Guggenheim to him announced Monday. He deserves it. Catch him at the Tishman auditorium in NYC Tuesday April 24, 8:30 pm, as part of the Granta Best Young Novelists panel. Then look for him on two more panels on the 27th, Friday, as part of the Pen Global Voices festival. Check his site for more specifics.

Mr. Alarcón is leaving soon for a tour of the Middle East sponsored by the US government. He will be visiting Syria and Palestine as well as Israel and Turkey. If you have a chance to meet him or hear him read, take it. His new book, Lost City Radio, is gripping and heartrending, set in a city that resembles Lima, Peru. He is one young American literary star the Arab world would do well to read. See also his collection of stories: War By Candlelight.

Spring Break Fever: Music Dept.

Something completely atypical for the Dove:

Includes Fairuz, Patty Smith, Lou Reed, Iggy Pop, Africa Bambaata and Gogol Bordello...

Since we're doing online music, how about a video from my childhood - Fairuz singing I loved you in the summer. However, that word that sounds not nice actually means "winter" (or rainy season). If you don't know Arabic I guess it sounds funny. Oh well... She's singing to a man that she loved him in the summer, loved him in the winter, waited for him summer and winter... and it's not going well...

Abinader, Hammad in Berkeley Tonight

As part of a new series at La Pena cultural center in Berkeley, my neighbor and teacher Elmaz Abinader will read poetry tonight, along with Palestinian-American poet Suheir Hammad: ...La Pena ...Just Announced:Arab Cultural Initiative.

March 1st, 2007: Elmaz Abinader and Suheir Hammad (music by Tony Khalife and Kamal Ghammache-Mansour) 7:30pm $12 @ La Peña Cultural Center 3105 Shattuck Avenue, Berkeley, CA 94705

Elmaz Abinader, an Arab American author, playwright and poet and the winner of the 2002 Goldies Award for Literature. Her poetry collection In the Country of My Dreams... won the 2000 Josephine Miles/ Pen Oakland Award. Elmaz Abinader makes no secret of her concerns as a writer and an activist. Much of her focus comes from growing up Arab-American, from coming from a part of the country that lacks diversity and from developing political and moral values consistent with ideas of compassion, equity and respect for the earth. Now a professor at Mills College, Elmaz's primary concern is giving voice to other writers of color. www.elmazabinader.com

Suheir Hammad, poet, who hails from Brooklyn, has been called "a new voice with an authentic blend of language that's her own, and music that belongs to the streets" (Elmaz Abinader, author of Children of the Roojme). Suheir's appearance on the debut episode of HBO's Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry merited generous media praise. Her work has been published in numerous periodicals, including The Amsterdam News, Essence, STRESS Hip-Hop Magazine and the Middle East Report and in anthologies including New to North America (Burning Bush Press), Listen Up! (Ballantyne), The Space Between Our Footsteps (Simon & Schuster) and 33 Things Every Girl Should Know About Women's History (Crown Publishers). Suheir produced plays include Blood Trinity (NY Hip-Hop Theatre Festival) and ReOrientalism (Center for Cultural Exchange). Suheir's poetry has been featured on the BBC World Service and National Public Radio. She has also appeared at universities and prisons throughout the United States. Suheir's new book of poetry ZaatarDiva, (Cypher Books) is available in bookstores now.

(Suheir Hammad will appear at a Fundraising Event for the Arab Cultural and Community Center, on March 2nd in San Francisco)

In two weeks, don't miss sculptor, ceramicist and political cartoonist Khalil Bendib in the same venue:

March 15th: Khalil Bendib 7:30pm $10 @ La Peña Cultural Center. Reception: 6pm (joined by Iraqi oud player Rahim AlHaj and Lebanese percussionist Souhail Kaspar) Khalil Bendib, is the janitor – or minesweeper – of political cartoonists in America. Potentially explosive issues avoided by other cartoonists, such as racial injustice, labor and class struggles, Zionism and U.S. imperialism, environmental degradation, the scapegoating of Arabs and Muslims and the complicity of our Orwellian media are all grist to his mill. Where others see sacred cows, Mr. Bendib sees the potential for shish kebab. Free of the usual Euro-centric, “Judeo-Christian,” corporate narrative, Khalil's cartoons offer a radical, indigenous perspective in a visual medium accessible to all and, as such, are the most systematically blacked out cartoons by the mass media in our country.

The son of survivors of the Algerian war of independence, Khalil Bendib grew up in Morocco and Algeria before coming to California at the age of 20. After an eight-year stint with the Gannett Newspapers at the San Bernardino County Sun, Khalil abruptly weaned himself from the security of a steady paycheck, resigning in disgust over increasing censorship of his work and becoming an independent in 1995.

More about La Pena's Arab Cultural Initiative later... Meanwhile, go see Elmaz and Suheir tonight! Barring childcare crisis, the Dove will be there insh'allah. Oh yeah, I almost forgot. The Dove will be reading at La Pena on March 21, 2007, at 7 pm, for the book launch of Homelands. More on that later. I should be working on my thesis, not blogging.

Kuwaiti Music Video: Like Jon Stewart Crossed With an Arab Britney Spears

You have to see this music video to believe it. It's a political satire as done by the Britney Spears of the Arab world channelling Jon Stewart while singing and belly dancing: Kuwaiti Singer's Video Satirizes the Bush War. The link is to Helena Cobban, who blogged a great explanation of the video. Read it to help you understand what the heck is going on - but the video itself tells the story, even if you don't understand the Arabic.

"Within the highly wired world of the urban Middle East, the latest and most potent means of political communication are short videos that are disseminated either via YouTube or from cellphone to cellphone.

"I'm writing this from Egypt. Everyone here agrees that the video images of the hanging of Saddam Hussein played a huge role in stirring up anti-US and also anti-Shiite feelings among many of the Sunni Muslims who make up the majority of the Arab world's people.

"Now, a well-known Kuwaiti singer called Shams has come out with a new 5-minute video called Ahlan! Ezayek? ("Hi! How are you"), which is a hard-hitting anti-Bush satire. She energetically sings and performs a well-known Egyptian popular song of romantic repudiation. "Hi! How are you... You think you're so great? I never want to see you again!" while hamming it up with a dizzying array of props representing aspects of Bush's policy in the Middle East. And yes, that includes Washington's "information" policies, too, with repeated visual references to newspaper stories and to round-table type TV talk-shows..." - Helena Cobban

Hurry, hurry and watch it. I am stunned. It's hilarious and biting all at once. By the way, for bonus points, Shams satirizes Arabs who get plastic surgery to look more European.

Juan Cole weighs in.

Arabic Music Video Fun

Everybody needs a little pop-tart MTV bellydancing: YouTube - Arabic Music Video - Noura - Noura (Bellydancing).

The wonders of YouTube. Made my day...

Here's another one by the Four Cats, sort of the Spice Girls of the Arab world. I'll have to look up what "Antar" means - it's an epithet they're calling the man in question. "In the evening when he comes home, he tells me my (back) is broken!" The wife is slaving away at the chores, she dolls herself up for his return, covers herself in rose petals, the husband is a player in a white suit, winking and flirting with ladies on the street, but as soon as he comes home to the delicious dish, he turns tail and runs.

A little clip at the end indicates that this is a remake of an old pop song - a brassy diva in a Scarlett O'Hara dress sings it on what looks like 1970s television.

I have some purist friends who might roll their eyes, but this stuff makes me happy.

Aswat - Arabic Music at Mills

I'm going to this tonight: Aswat: Arabic Community Choir and Orchestra.

CCM Songlines Series ASWAT

Aswat choir and orchestra is a community group that presents Arabic folk and classical vocal and instrumental music.

Saturday, November 19, 2005, 8:00 pm

Mills College Concert Hall
5000 MacArthur Blvd.
Oakland, California 94613

Saed Muhssin: Oud, Music director
Nabila Mango: Founding Member, Executive Director

$12 general, $6 seniors

Aswat is a project of Zawaya,

a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting Arabic Music, Art, Poetry, Literature, Theature, and Culture through instruction and presentation.

Zawaya was established in 2001 by a group of Arabs and Americans in the Bay Area to promote the public expression of Arab art and culture. By providing a forum for exhibiting all forms of Arab culture, we strive to create understanding of this rich heritage.

Zawaya works with any and all existing Arab and American organizations that support Arab culture. We have recently collaborated successfully with The Arab Cultural Center and ADC-San Francisco Chapter.

Zawaya sponsors Aswat, the only Bay Area Arab community choir, which has been promoting Arabic music for several years. This multi-ethnic and diverse choir has performed at the Academy of Sciences, at Arab Festivals in San Francisco and Seattle, and at many colleges and universities. Performances have raised funds for Arab families in time of need, but the primary focus is on love of the music itself.

Lovely SF Chronicle piece on Aswat here.