Oum Kalthoum, Om Kolthom, Om Kalsoum, Omm Kalsoum, Omme Kolsoum, Oom Koolsum, Oum Kalthoum, Oum Kalthum, Oum Kalsoum, Oum Kaltsoum, Oum Kolthoum, Oum Koulsoum, Oum Kulthum, Oum Kulthume, Um Kalthoum,

Youtube is placing an add in the middle. Man, is that annoying. I am hoping that will go away if I play as embedded video.

"Ela Arafat Allah" is so good.

Kinda bugs me, that with her deserved fame, her name is still "mother of Kalthoum". Her birthname, btw, is Fātimah ʾIbrāhīm as-Sayyid al-Biltāǧī.

I guess you know that Umm Kulthum was one of the companions of the Prophet, so it's got a certain cachet in that cultural context.

I don't know the history of how the subject of this thread ended up with that name though. I don't remember if I've ever read an explanation.

I can also see how the name's background doesn't necessarily make it any less annoying that her name is mother of somebody or other.

40s and 50s songs are generally so much better. There are a few exceptions, but really just a few as far as I'm concerned. *eating a handful of Ajwa dates*

I love that Spotify has a bunch of her "singles" in chronological order now. There are some difficult songs with difficult titles that I've always had trouble keeping track of. This helps.

I mean, a lot of the later material has fantastic and memorable melodies but the songs don't work as well as vehicles for her singing.

"taking a [vocal] line out for a walk"

Another Saturday with El Sett, coming later, once I'm more awake.

If the single-digit humidity doesn't kill me.

I made an Oum Kalthoum playlist. Nothing special, just my favorite songs as available on Spotify. (There are some crucial, commercially available live recordings missing from Spotify.)

https://open.spotify.com/user/rudipherousoxide/playlist/57PCJ9HMDzgJ4YnVb6yYHb

I actually feel guilty it's so short, but I was being very selective. I might add some later songs eventually. If they had a good live Hazihi Leylati. . . Or maybe if they had the studio Inta Omri. . . The beginning of Baid Anak is stunning, but I do think it goes on too long, with too many audience-demanded repetitions of sections that don't actually help.

I haven't watched this yet, but the introduction alone is mind-blowing. Nasser arrives with his security detail/entourage, at one point.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Md0utlaK6Gs

Domtek is either a great new channel or one I had missed previously.

I don't really love Amal Hayati though.

A very fast-tempoed Howwa Sahih that I don't think I've heard before. Definitely have not seen before.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ReVC__gtU-M

That's more like it.

(Abdel Wahab songs so overrated. Sorry to be a broken record.)

I think Oum Kalthoum audiences might be my favorite audience. Another Nasser siting at the end of the video above, incidentally. Unfortunately, there's a glitch in the middle and the sound drops out.

Also, the seriousness of the announcers is great.

Howwa Sahih really has Zakariya Ahmed written all over it.

Patience has its limits, indeed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PwJQV_smUwM

Have we realized yet how perfect this is?

Did not realize till the other night that there’s a song in the Tony Award winning musical, The Band’s Visit, called “”Oum Kulthum and Omar Sharif.” One of the stars of the show who sang it on the Tonys, gave a shoutout when she won an award, to the late Kulthum.

Anyone seen 'Looking for Oum Kulthum'? I wasn't that big of a fan, Shirin Neshat makes it into a meta-movie that is to a large part about herself, but the recreations of scenes from Kulthums career are really good.

Haven’t seen it.

Hello Rudipherous and anyone else who can be of help.

I've got a note that I should start investigating Umm Kulthum at this point, but not sure where to start. What I need is a reasonably-sized (say 2CD) retrospective covering her whole recording career, and (very important!) dates of recording for each track. Does such a thing exist?

I missed Frederik asking who else had seen the film, but I didn't like it very much either for the same meta reasons as he did. An actual biography would have been nice.

From what I remember, trying to find decent cds is a total crapshoot if not outright impossible not knowing arabic. I ended up buying MP3s and finding random downloads mostly for my collection, which by the time I gave up searching ran about 12-15 acceptable recordings which deliver the goods (and I think 3 of them I have on cd, all excellent, and all by the same label with colorful arabesque artwork and no liner notes or recording info.) I still listen to her sometimes, her work remains interesting over time. IMO the sweet spot is any given live recording from 1950s through maybe mid-60s that runs 30-50 minutes. That stuff is invariably sublime though also invariably lo fi. Later recordings from the 70s are slicker and sound really good and hi fi but are completely ruined for this somewhat discerning listener by goofy sounding harmonium and sometimes electric surf-guitar sounding oud (or some kind of twangy electric stringed non-guitar anyway). The surf-oud and harmonium isn't part of the sonic equation earlier thankfully!!! The mid-period (I guess) longform live stuff I dig is all violins/cellos and percussion, and thoroughly righteous.

Early period for me is the studio stuff, very short tunes for 45rpm of little interest, and later would be the gross harmonium live recordings.

Thanks for the tips Liam, and

my collection, which by the time I gave up searching ran about 12-15 acceptable recordings which deliver the goods

Sure, check back here in a day or so. If you want I'll try to email you all of them as onedrive links. They're all different tunes, each performance its own long mp3, and I think all essentially radio bootlegs anyway because that's how this stuff was originally disseminated.

I just searched Oum Kalthoum blog and re-found the first tune/download of hers I listened to extensively, Esal Rouhak, and the download link is still active somehow! It's a pretty awesome performance and tune, and the rest I treasure are along these lines, so give it a shot:

http://www.eatbees.com/blog/2006/12/02/esal-rouhak/

That would be brilliant, thanks!

Checking this one out now - this - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umm_Kulthum#Selected_discography - says it's from 1970, which is very late indeed.

Listened to this last night, really good thanks, I didn't realise the length of the tracks was because each one was like an album and with so much drama and variety.

The previous thing I had was a 1924 recording which isn't really up to scratch, even for 1924, so good to get it now.

Cool, you're welcome! Yeah, I guess that's what I mean by the goods; the songs when she was exclusively a live performer are all like miniature operas or something, long sonic tapestries that unfold and develop one or two simple ideas. There's always some really neat musical motives that gets put through a ton of variations and which she ornaments and illuminates with her voice. She's kind of a force of nature, really!

I just sent an email to the address connected to your profile with a onedrive download link to a folder with all the ones I have, including the later ones which I dislike solely because of some questionable instrumentation choices. As for the later ones, the tunes are still good, and the quality isn't hazy at all, it's very crisp/clear. You might dig them more than me, so!

Thought of this thread tonight as I saw the play “The Band’s Visit” and the Israeli woman cafe owner sang a song called “Oum Kalthoum and Omar Sharif” and she and the Alexandria, Egypt Band leader quoted Sharif movie lines. The cafe owner mentioned grownup and hearing Kalthoum songs on the radio

Growing up

My knowledge of Oum Kathoum music remains very superficial. Need to remedy that sometime

Anyone know anything about this upcoming batch of LPs? Dunno if I'm in a position to buy them all, but they look pretty tempting:

https://lightintheattic.net/releases/8965-alf-leila-wa-leila
https://lightintheattic.net/releases/8966-el-hob-kollo
https://lightintheattic.net/releases/8967-enta-omri
https://lightintheattic.net/releases/8968-laylat-hob

https://soundcloud.com/wexnercenter/esra-canogullari-8ulentinaand-lara-sarkissian-umm-al-atlal

UMM / AL ATLAL is a collaborative sound piece composed by Esra Canoğulları and Lara Sarkissian. This hour-long piece deconstructs and abstracts a live performance of Umm Kulthum's song Al Atlal. Umm Kultum was known for live performances that lasted hours, with individual songs lasting up to an hour each, the crowd participation playing an essential role in these durational and enchanting live shows. UMM / AL ATLAL takes a similar approach to abstraction as Sahar’s sculptural radio tower- isolating and embedding individual lyrics while reinterpreting their form. The collaborative nature of this sound sculpture is our contemporary version of the audience call and response participation that is present in all of Umm Kulthum’s live performances.

Esra Canoğulları (8ULENTINA)and Lara Sarkissian: UMM / AL ATLAL By wexnercenter is licensed under a Creative Commons License.

piece goes along with this exhibit- https://wexarts.org/exhibitions/sahar-khoury-umm