Though its birth does not precede five years, Mahraganat music has surged into a phenomenon, invading Egypt’s sonic atmosphere and beyond. This phenomenon has crossed borders and seas and made it into the European and international acoustic vernacular. The adolescents who, five years ago, huddled in the streets of Matariya and Salam City on Cairo’s margins, hoping for nothing more than the chance to perform at a wedding or two every week, now roam Europe, from festival to festival. There, they bring to the crowds that fervent rhythm that has brought this musical movement such a huge following in so little time. [h2]In the Beginning There Was the DJ[/h2] At the turn of the millennium, the DJ had begun to make an appearance at Egyptian weddings. DJs emerged as an affordable alternative to live musicians at weddings, and their rise in popularity coincided with the spread of computers in Egypt, and the attendant affinity that primarily young men developed towards this rising profession. Amid the economic stranglehold that the cassette tape industry imposed on chaabi music at the time—dominated as it was by industry “heavyweights” such as Amro Diab and Mohamed Fouad—the rise of the DJ all but eliminated the genre that relied on weddings as its main source of livelihood. Yet, the spread of computers and various recording programs marked the genre’s salvation. As the twenty-first century kicked off, a new generation of chaabi singers emerged, such as Mahmoud El-Leithy and Mahmoud El-Hosseiny and others, who relied on their computers to record their material, to evade the costs of studio recordings. It was this generation that was the first to make use of electronic sound effects in their music. [h2]And Then Came the Mobile Phone[/h2] After computers, there came the eruption of mobile phone use, and before 3G internet, mobile phone stores would sell monophonic tunes that were coded into the phones using the phone’s keypad. Amr, a young man from Ain Shams, worked in one such store. One day, for the sake of experimentation, rather than code a hit track onto a phone, he decided to compose his own tune. As luck would have it, this tune became a famous ringtone in the neighborhood, and in time Amr was approached by a chaabi singer, asking for permission to use the tune for one of his songs. Amr went on to develop his musical and technological skills, adopting the moniker Doctor Amr Ħaħa, the composer of “El-Shandarbolla,” one of the first tunes that could be characterized as a Mahraganat tune. Like electronic music, Mahraganat music relies on a base loop, but unlike Western electronic music, the loop is usually an oriental beat. The loop is cut through with rap-like vocals, backed up by a mix of sound effects and loud noises. Ħaħa would later go on to work with dozens of artists who would in turn become the ambassadors of the genre; Sadat, Alaa Fifty, Oka & Ortega, to name a few. He was also known to occasionally collaborate with Alexandrian Mahraganat musician Filo. These musicians cut out the role of production companies, choosing instead to resort to more democratized technologies to record their music, and releasing their creations online for free, relying on their income from live performances at weddings to earn their keep. Others, however, were not satisfied to leave it at that. [h2]Mahraganat Economics[/h2] Despite its immense popularity, Mahraganat music is still derided as lowbrow, and the state fails to recognize its performers, as the majority of them are not members of the various musical syndicates—a legal prerequisite for live performances in Egypt. These prevailing attitudes culminated in Mahraganat songs being banned on state television and other mainstream channels, while radio hosts make sure not to broadcast “that kind of thing.” Yet, against this, Mahraganat music has expanded well beyond its economic and production circles, consolidated by the emergence of alternative production companies, such as 100Copies. The company began as a production studio for electronic and experimental music, and provided Mahraganat singers with a platform to record their music. On occasion, the studio would produce songs for these artists at a symbolic cost, in exchange for the rights to the songs, which were released for free on YouTube. 100Copies relied on a model wherein they would reap advertising profits from YouTube when these songs went viral or catapulted into popularity, in addition to selling the song electronically on other outlets. Musical groups such as Oka & Ortega and El-Dakhlaweya focused their efforts on trying to go to the silver screen, and appearing in on-screen dramas, such as the popular show “Fifa Atata” starring Mohamed Saad, and the films of Mohamed El-Sobky and Mohamed Ramadan. Yet, another camp chose to chart a different course; with the Arab Spring came an upsurge in attention from the media and the West towards the region and its cultural production, creating a pathway into European concerts and festivals. Among the most prominent musicians who tool this course was Islam Chipsy, who evolved his music to include additional visual aspects, ultimately becoming one of the most recognized faces of the genre abroad. Mahraganat emerged during a boom in cultural production, in an atmosphere that was far more celebrating of diversity, providing young people with an outlet to express themselves amid revolutionary spirits and a proliferation of violence that has continued to this day. This was reflected in the lyrics of Mahraganat songs, which often avoid sentimentality, but rather express the difficulty of surviving in a treacherous environment, as related in 2015’s hit single, “Mafĩsh Săħib Beyetsăħib.” As time goes by, more stringent measures are imposed to restrict the space for broadcasting Mahraganat, such as the granting power of arrest to the then-head of the Musical Syndicate, Hany Shaker. While the future remains uncertain, one thing that seems to be clear is the inverse proportionality between official tolerance towards Mahraganat and its popularity.
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