If you walk through the densely-populated popular quarters, or now even the city centers, of Cairo, Alexandria or any other Egyptian city you’d likely hear the pulsating sounds of mahraganat, a musical genre that has emerged in the last decade, emanating from small street restaurants, tuk-tuks, taxis and cafes. Its autotuned vocals and raw synthetic beat embedded in electronic loops and syncopated drums is not only a new music style but also a novel feature of Egypt’s urban sound milieu. While at least two feature-length documentaries have been made about mahraganat (Underground/On the Surface and Electro Chaabi), there are few high-quality short films produced on the topic. In late December, a 3-minute mini-documentary was released by director and electronic musician Wael Alaa in collaboration with website Nowness, featuring mahraganat artists in the poor Cairo area of Bulaq. With its stunning cinematography, the film is an intimate display of the people and spaces making up the genre as seen from their perspective. “I didn’t plan to encounter the artists behind this style,” the Cairo-based filmmaker explains. “Yet, when I did, I spent an entire month building a solid relationship with this…
Short Film Displays Intimate World of Cairo’s Mahraganat Music
January 8, 2018
