User:Egyptian Protests and music

Music after the revolution in Egypt

The Egyptian revolution took place following a popular uprising that began on 25th of January 2011.  It was a diverse movement of demonstrations, marches,plaza occupations, riots, non-violent civil resistance,acts of civil disobedience and labour strikes.Millions of protesters from a variety of socio-economic and religious backgrounds demanded the overthrow of the regimeof Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.During these hard times Egypt witnessed a great boost in its arts and musical culture.

.The25th Revolution and the fall of former Egyptian President, Hosni Mubarak, in February 2011 ushered a new era of Arts that reflectsnew social and political environment. The revolution triggered a newpublic culture. Many genres of arts emerged such as street art which iscommonly known as graffiti. Graffiti dates back to pharonic period where theyused to draw on the walls of their temples, but the birth of "revolutionary graffiti" in Egypt tookplace during the first days of the revolution, it was used to send political messages as an alternativeto media channels. Some streets inside and outside Cairo turned into graffiti hubs such as Mohamed Mahmoud Street in Cairo and Al Gomhuria in Assiut.. Some of the famous artists during andpost revolution were Aya tarek, Chico and Elteenen.

.Politicalsongs and music were rebirthed during the revolution and after it by unknown young singers and underground bands and some other famous singers and bands such as Eskenderella and Cairokee used to rockTahrir square with their political lyrics and influential music to keep the protesters' spirit high during 18 days revolution. Originally political songswere born on 1956 in Egypt after the war by El Tanbura andthe pioneer Sheikh Imam (1918-1995) who was a major pillar inthe Arabic political song. He was followed by many other popular Egyptian singers contribute in political song such as Um Kalthoum, Abdel Halim Hafez, and Abdel Wahab.

.A new genre was created and started becoming the most beloved by almost half the population of Cairo during the revolution this genre is known as “Mahrgan” which means festival, but outsiders call it 'electro sha'bi the name electro is added as the songs produced are mostly created electronically. The rhythms that drive mahragan are for the most part resolutely sha‘bi.It consists of a constant beat accompanied by voices most often distorted by synthesized auto tuning, the voices are mostly rap or chanting.The most famous Mahrgan artists who appeared during the revolutions were Amr Haha, Oka and Figo.

Finally, I find that thegrowth and change of art and music after the revolution had both pros and cons.As the genre “Mahrgan” doesn't not seem so musical yet so many people loves itand consider it there favourite. While the growth of graffiti is a good thing in some cases because sometimes graffiti artists ruin private property o rpublic property and that would get them in trouble, but the good side of itthat people get to express their opinion in a good artistic way with not much harm.