Zahed Sultan

Call for freedom and unity from Kuwait via Western Sahara.

Mariem Hassan was a legendary singer and poet from Western Sahara, representing Sahrawi people. She was known from singing (mostly) in the local dialect called Hassaniya Arabic, and that’s what we hear in one of her “hits”, a protest song called “Arrabi al Arabe” – check out this live fan recording from a Helsinki festival back in 2012.

Mariem Hassan passed away five years ago “in the Saharawi refugee camps near Tinduf (Algeria), surrounded by her family”. She has lived many years in Spain, but then she decided to devote her final days to her family – she had nine siblings!

It’s only a coincidence that just a few weeks before we lost her, we introduce here on beehype a talented Kuwaiti producer Zahed Sultan, who reinterpreted “sobering stories of the traditionally nomadic, Bedouin life”. Mariem actually stemmed from a nomadic family breeding camels and goats.

So this might sound almost like fate that five years later we get a chance to hear Mariem and Zahed together. “I add beats, percussions, and synths and sing with Mariem in Arabic to build on calls of freedom and unity”, Zahed wrote in the description, and we can only join the choir.

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Zahed Sultan on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Soundcloud.

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