In Focus: Halim El-Dabh

By Magda Magdy

Halim El-Dabh ward radio

March 4, 1921 – Sept. 2, 2017

Musician, Pan-Africanist, creative musicologist, seminal composer, and philosopher Halim El-Dabh's career spanned several decades. I first stumbled upon his work while researching early electronic music, and I was cast under a spell. I find his sonic cosmologies and graphic notations of particular interest. He is widely known for his Expression of Zar piece, which he produced using samples taken from an Egyptian Zar ceremony — editing, manipulating, and arranging these sounds to create what's considered the earliest piece of electronic tape music.

I highly recommend listening to this compilation, lovingly curated by El-Dabh researcher Joe Namy and Benjamin Gaydos, under the guidance of Halim El-Dabh's estate:

"Considered to be one of the earliest composers of electronic music, Halim El-Dabh (1921–2017) was an Egyptian-American musician, ethnomusicologist, and educator. The works in this compilation span his astounding six-decade career, moving across Halim El-Dabh's eclectic, undefinable, and groundbreaking oeuvre — including field recordings, concertos, electronic music compositions, and improvised instrumentals."

The Wondrous Reverberations of Halim El-Dabh — Annihaya Records (Bandcamp)

Also from the archives, to celebrate Halim's centenary, Savvy Contemporary in Berlin organized a two-day event entitled "4100 Years of Re/Verberations With Halim El-Dabh," with invocations inviting performers to respond to his work.

Invocations, Part I

Invocations, Part II

Also worth mentioning: there is a biography written by one of his students, The Musical World of Halim El-Dabh, by Denise A. Seachrist.

"Egyptian-born composer Halim El-Dabh has studied with the giants of the 20th-century musical composition and conducting world. Although The Musical World of Halim El-Dabh focuses on his career from his arrival in the U.S. in 1950 to his retirement from the faculty of Kent State University in 1991, it also explores his early life in Egypt, its influence on him musically, and his creative life following retirement."

The Musical World of Halim El-Dabh — on Amazon

I leave you with one of my favorite melodies:

Halim El-Dabh — The Reappearance of the Lotus Flower