You can hear history in Mazaher’s music. Rhythms and songs that carry traces of traditions from the Horn of Africa to the Arabian Peninsula, passed down through generations of practitioners who learned the music without notation. Um Sameh, Um Hassan and Nour El Sabah are among the last remaining zār practitioners in Egypt – an ancient ritual built on song, polyrhythmic drumming and dance.
Zār has long been misread as exorcism and demonised at home. In reality it is something far more understated and at the same time more radical. A ritual carried by women – men play more secondary roles – to work through spirituality, harmony and the weight of social constraints.
Every week Mazaher fill a room at a cultural centre in downtown Cairo, a block from the Nile. There is no stage; the floor is covered with cushions. Unlike the songs recorded for Mazaher’s first and only album Zār (2020), the music is allowed to unfold over several hours. It begins slowly, almost mournful, and builds gradually towards a trance-like state. Voices, the tamboura – a six-string lyre – and percussion form the foundation of something that is more ceremonial gathering than band in any traditional sense.
