Egyptian Rai

Ramzy, Hossam – Egyptian Rai (ARC)
Reviewed by Sadie O., 8/25/06
Rather traditional Egyptian small orchestra, fine rhythms. Odd album concept, as most of the songs originate outside Egypt, and none of them resemble Rai as it’s commonly played.…
All instrumentals. All extremely fine playing. I like 8 best.
1. **Yemeni, rather uptempo; fabulous doumbek ensemble, joined by various Egyptian horns, some sort of melodium.
2. *Kuwaiti, starts with solo oud improvisation (2 minutes), then downtempo doumbek and bells, snaky cool groove. Ends a few seconds short.
3. *Moroccan, sneakily cool midtempo beat, flute. Handclaps in latter part of song, a bit reminiscent of Flamenco.
4. ***uptempo Egyptian number, joyous sound.
5. ***Lebanese, uptempo, great bass, cover of a Walik Tawfik hit.
6. **Egyptian, uptempo, lots of doumbek. Really sounds a lot like a belly dance number.
7. *uptempo, more belly dance groove. Liner notes say this is where jazz comes from – I’m not hearing it, but who am I to say… Lots of trumpet, anyway!
8. ****somewhat downtempo, fantastic doumbek sound, horns with lots of echo, mysterious and gorgeous. From the Gulf. Ends a few seconds short.
9. starts very quiet, apart from the doumbek rather more like international modern jazz than “Arabian”. I’m not feelin’ this one…