Daoud & Saleh Al-Kuwaity
Daoud & Saleh Al-Kuwaity
Genres: world, folk, traditional, World Music, folklore
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About Daoud & Saleh Al-Kuwaity
The Al-Kuwaity brothers Saleh (1908-1986) and Daud (1910-1976) were Kuwait-born Jewish-Iraqi musicians. Originally called Daud and Saleh Ezra, their father, a merchant, moved from the Iraqi city of Basra together with some fifty other Jewish families to form the Jewish community of Kuwait. When Saleh was ten years old, and Daud eight, they received a gift from their uncle who came back from a business trip to India: a violin and an oud. Saleh began studying Iraqi and Kuwaiti music under Khaled Al-Bakar, a famous Kuwaiti oud player of the time. He soon began to compose his own music. His first song, "Walla Ajbani Jamalec" (By god, I love your beauty), is still heard on Gulf radio stations. While still children the brothers started performing before dignitaries in Kuwait and making a name for themselves as child prodigies. Soon Iraqi record companies began recording the brothers and distributing their music nationally. Because of their success, the Al-Kuwaity family moved back to Basra, where Saleh joined the qanun master Azur, learning the maqam style of composition, considered the highest and most prestigious of all styles in Arab music. The brothers started performing in the nightclubs of Basra, and after a while – a result of their growing success – the family moved to Baghdad. The Iraqi capital, one of the biggest musical centres in the Arab world at the time, welcomed the brothers. Saleh used to play violin and compose, Daud performing the compositions on oud and vocals. Saleh also started attending music school in Baghdad, where he studied both Arab and western music, soon receiving requests from artists who wanted him to write music for them. In 1933, at the peak of their success, the brothers were approached by one of the greatest names in Arab music, the Egyptian superstar Oum Kathoum. The singer, who rarely recorded works by non-Egyptian composers, contacted Saleh during one of her visits to Baghdad and asked him to write a song for her. In 1932 another Egyptian star, Mohammed Abdel Wahab, arrived in Baghdad and asked to meet and play with the brothers. Saleh, who hoped to expand his musical horizons through this meeting, was amazed to discover that the great musician actually wanted to learn from the two brothers. Saleh taught him to use the Lahami scale, unique to Selah's music, which was later used in many of Abdel Wahab's famous works. The brothers' success spread to the Iraqi ruling class, and soon they became King Faisal's favuorite entertainers. They performed for him and composed music for various formal events - the highlight being a piece composed by Saleh for the King's coronation ceremony. In 1936 Iraq's Minister of Education asked Daud and Saleh to take part in establishing Iraq's first radio station. The two became founding members of Iraqi radio and, together with the Egyptian singer Fat'hia Ahmad, performed and played at the opening ceremony. From then until their emigration to Israel, they played in the station's orchestra, of which Saleh was named director. They also played on King Faisal's private radio station. The Al-Kuwaity brothers continued performing and playing throughout the Arab world up until the 1950s, gaining fame and influence with both the mass of listeners and the Iraqi political elite. They recorded hundreds of works, some of them incorporating western elements such as the waltz. In addition to mastering the high maqam style they also wrote songs in the aa'thba style – popular music with themes of sadness and loss. The brothers also composed music for the cinema, including the music for an Arabic version of Romeo and Juliet, and worked with some of the greatest actors in the Arab world. They also set up two clubs in which their concerts were held – one for the summer and one for the winter. Throughout their career, the brothers never hid their Jewish identity. They made use of their fame and fortune to help the Jewish community in Iraq, both with material aid for the needy and with influence in the political establishment when necessary. At the beginning of the 1950s they decided to leave Baghdad and join the big wave of emigration from Iraq to the newly-established Israel. In spite of their wealth, and the wide range of possibilities before them, Saleh and Daud chose to leave everything behind. They emigrated to the young Jewish state without using their connections to gain permission to take their property with them. Saleh and Daud's status in Iraq was of no use to them when faced with the difficulties of finding their place in Israel. Their welcome in the new country was harsh, as a result of the mass migration of Jews from oppressive Arab regimes. They were sent first to live in a temporary tent camp in Beer Yaakov; later they moved to the Hatikva quarter of Tel Aviv, where they sometimes played in the Noah café. Upon their arrival the brothers also began playing and performing on the Arab channel of Israeli radio, soon becoming two of its leaders. They performed as guest soloists with the Arabic orchestra of the Israeli Radio led by Zuzu Mussa. For many years they gave a regular live radio performance, with thousands of people in Israel and millions in Iraq and Kuwait listening. With the help of the radio dozens of songs written by them in Israel became hits in the Arab world. Despite leaving their homeland, and the state of war between Israel and the Arab world, radio stations in Kuwait and Iraq kept on broadcasting their music – omitting their names and nationality. Their hits are still played on the radio throughout the Arab world, and they have fans among both the Iraqi and Kuwaiti people, and with Iraqi and Kuwaiti expatriates throughout the world. Songs such as "El-hajer mu ada ghariba" (Neglect isn't a foreign custom), "Hadri chai hadri" (Make the tea), "Ma tqulli ya hilu min wein Alla jabek" (Tell me, beautiful one, from where did the Lord bring you?) and "Walla ajabni jamalek", are heard daily throughout the Arab world and are a central plank in the canon of Iraqi and Kuwaiti music.
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