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Habib Belk, like Tinariwen and Mark Eliyahu, represent that traditional music that is finally able to make the leap in quality, remaining true to its history but trying to make the leap and become music of the world, not of the countryside.
Habib Belk
Habib Belkziz was born in 1989 in Marrakech, in a family strongly linked to Gnawa both under a spiritual and musical aspect. From an early age, in fact, he will assist his relatives during the layali, evening meetings of Gnawa who use music as a means to get closer to Allah. Given his great passion for this genre, he began to accompany Maâlem Abdelkbir Merchane on a permanent basis, one of the most important voices of Marrakech and his mother’s cousin, who will provide him with the first musical rudiments.
Shortly afterwards, Maalem himself will be given his first Guembri, the instrument symbol of this music, to which he will give the name of Auoicha, treating it as a relative. From that moment, he will begin to perform throughout the city, making himself known for his great skill and rhythm. From 2005 he will start and perform officially with the pseudonym of Habib Belk, the qualitative leap will do so with the move to Germany in 2013. Arrived in Dortmund to study, the young maalem will find a very fertile ground to contaminate his sounds with R&B, Trap and Reggaeton rhythms, bringing his music to acquire the unique connotation that we love so much today.
The new Gnawa
In fact, it is impossible not to be fascinated by a musician capable of bringing a real evolution in his music, while remaining absolutely anchored to the past. Habib Belk, in fact, does not upset the genre, but manages to “clean” it from the dust that sometimes tends to cover a way of making music that is now over a hundred years old. When you listen to it, you will absolutely feel Gnawa, but you will also understand that it is something new, just released, not yet another reinterpretation of ancient passages.
Habib Belk, like Tinariwen and Mark Eliyahu, represent that traditional music that is finally able to make the leap in quality, remaining true to its history but trying to make the leap and become music of the world, not of the countryside. With the increasingly massive presence of the internet in our lives, there is a need for artists of this type, able not only to preserve, but also to evolve their art, thus giving the future the opportunity to truly discover the wonders of the past Incredible artist to be absolutely recovered, we can’t wait for some concerts in Italy, we could not miss it.
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