Who was Smarda el Olgia? A microhistorical account of Rachel Hayat and her 1935 recordings

A year and half ago, our friend Thomas at the Ceints de bakélite blog put up an exquisite piece of malouf music by a seemingly unknown Tunisian artist by the name of Smarda el Olgia. After a bit of digging around my own collection, some sorting through archives, and a turn to some published sources, we can begin to piece together a few biographical details for Smarda el Olgia - as well as the circumstances that led to this recording.

Rachel Hayat (Sitbon)

Smarda el Olgia was born Rachel Sitbon in Tunis in 1892. She married Israel-Eugene Hayat and thus became known as Mrs. Rachel Hayat (Sitbon). In addition to being a fixture of Tunisian Jewish high society, presiding over a number of charitable organizations, she was also very well regarded among practitioners of the eastern Algerian and Tunisian classical Andalusian tradition known as malouf.

Throughout the end of the 1920s and the 1930s, patrimony became the watchword across the Maghrib. In large part it was fear of Egyptian music’s popularity that caused French colonial figures and indigenous musical impresarios to leap into action. Thus, institutions dedicated to safeguarding Andalusian music in all of its local forms, as well as committed to protecting Moroccan, Algerian, and Tunisian musical traditions more broadly constructed, were established. One thinks of the erection of the conservatory in Rabat, the formation of orchestras like El Djazairia in Algeria, and of course, the emergence of La Rachidia in Tunis in 1934. As part of this effort, Emile Gau, Director General of Public Instruction and Beaux-Arts in Tunisia, concerned that the suites associated with malouf were in danger of being lost (a common trope and no doubt influenced by the work of Baron Rodolphe d’Erlanger and La Rachidia), commissioned Rachel Hayat to make a series of malouf recordings in Paris in order to preserve Tunisian heritage in perpetuity (take a close look at the label and you’ll see much of this background come alive). And in September 1935, Rachel Hayat (Sitbon), under the name Smarda el Olgia (Smarda or Zmarda was a common Tunisian Jewish name), performed that task beautifully - recording this and dozen or so other records.

P.S. There is always a bit of serendipity in writing these posts. In the course of putting this one together, I discovered that Rachel Hayat’s daughter may have lived in Los Angeles for much of her life - and even been involved in a bit of a Hollywood-esque scandal. I’m still gathering details but will keep everyone posted. Hag Sameah!

A Rose By Any Other Name: La Jeune Ouarda (Warda) sings "Ya Oummi"

For the fourth night of Hannukah, I bring you the earliest recording of the classic, "Ya Oummi." 

Like their Ashkenazi counterparts, North African Jewish musicians sang songs to honor their mothers. "Ya Oummi" (Dear Mama), written, composed, and eventually recorded by Tunisian-born Youcef Hedjaj (aka José de Suza), was one of those songs. While Algerian Jewish chanteuse Line Monty is most closely associated with Ya Oummi - and indeed, her version is stunning, she was not the first woman to record it.

That distinction went to a young, up-and-coming Muslim vocalist who then went by the stage name of la jeune Ouarda (al-fattat Ouarda). Yes, before she went from Ouarda to Warda, before she appended al Jazairia (the Algerian) to her name, and before she left Algeria and married Egyptian composer Baligh Hamdi, la jeune Ouarda committed a beautiful version of Youcef Hedjaj’s Ya Oummi to record. For those who know the stately Warda, I think you'll be blown away by her teenage self.

You can compare to Line Monty's iconic take here:

And you can hear Youcef Hedjaj not only singing Ya Oummi here but also providing us with the details of just how popular the song was (in French).

 

Since that time we have been blessed with a number of remarkable covers, including this by young Israeli Moroccan artist Neta Elkayam (with exquisite piano by Amit Hai Cohen).

Banned! Tracing the Journey of a Lili Labassi Disc from Release to Censorship in the late 1930s

As the third night of Hanukkah approaches, I bring you one of my favorite records from Algeria (a disc which happened to enjoy a tremendous amount of success in Morocco - as you'll soon see).

We begin again with a question and a mystery. Did Lili Labassi, among the most popular of interwar Algerian recording stars, sing clandestinely about Moroccan political exile Allal El Fassi on his now difficult to find “Lellah yal ghadi lessahra” (O you, who is going to the Sahara)? According to French colonial authorities in late 1930s and early 1940s Morocco, he most certainly did. As a result, his Polyphon disc (issue number 46.117) was subjected to repeated ban throughout the Cherifian Empire in 1938, 1939, and 1940. To the French, his lyrics read as nothing less than subversive…and served as nothing less than a reminder to Moroccans to keep Allal El Fassi in their hearts. He was after, “still alive” (mazal hay mazal):

“O you who is going to the land of the gazelles!

If you find my love (ghazal/gazelle)

Tell him: He’s.. he’s still alive (mazal hay mazal)

No one can replace him in my heart…”

Lili Labassi re-release on Philips

But to most Moroccans at the time, the ambiguous “he” was heard as “she” - as is common in much of North African music (think: male singers longing for their habibi and not habibti). Thus, “he’s still alive,” was understood as “she’s still alive” (mazal hay mazal) and no one could replace “her in my heart.” In fact, in the massive search and seizure efforts undertaken by the French to find the Labassi disc, police discovered the record time and again in the brothels of cities like Casablanca, Rabat, Fez, Meknes, and Agadir. Why? Because Labassi’s “O you who is going to the Sahara,” was a love song (and seemingly a song to make love to as well).

Almost eighty years since its first ban, Labassi’s original is hard to come by. Despite the fact that it was released again on Polydor/Polyphon and also on Phillips, few copies remain. What we do have, however, is a version of “O you who is going to the Sahara” recorded by the inimitable Blond Blond, Lili Labassi’s musical disciple, which as you’ll hear, is fantastic, pulsing, and damn-near danceable.

One question remains, of course. Did Lili Labassi know that any of this was happening? Well, take a listen to his similar “Mazal haï mazal” (She’s still alive), released on the Pacific label in the 1950s and recently uploaded by Jon Ward on Excavated Shellac. Mazal haï mazal contains many of the same elements of “Lellah yal ghadi lessahra” although this version seems to lay any fears of political subversion to rest.

What is clear, however, is that Labassi’s song, first released in the mid-1930s, retained its popularity through the 1950s and some might argue until today.

Blond Blond performs Lellah yal ghadi lessahra live. Note: song is listed as "mazal hay mazal."

"If You Ain't Got No Money": Louisa Tounsia sings about marriage

As I mentioned in my last post, I’m going to be putting up one of my favorite North African rarities from Youtube once a day for the duration of Hanukkah. As we enter evening two of the holiday, we’re going to stick with Tunisia.

This mid-1930s Louisa Tounsia release on Polyphon should remind us that North African music was more than just malouf or other variations of the Andalusian classical suite (although these traditions were and are no doubt incredibly important). Part and parcel of the repertoire of the Maghrib’s Jewish (and Muslim) musicians were popular songs on topical subjects. Written by Maurice Benäis, Tunisian Jewish vocalist, lyrcist, and orchestral leader extraordinaire, and performed by Louisa Tounsia, "Ma fiche flous" (literally, “there is no money,” but loosely translated by me as, “If you ain’t got no money”) in many ways narrates the changing status of women in early twentieth century Tunisia. In "Ma fiche flous," Tounsia gets to decide who she’s going to make her husband and as she says in the chorus, “If you ain’t got no money, then we ain’t got words, honey.” But for the man who can provide, Tounsia reminds, he may have more than a few options (“If you got nice threads, then you got yourself your choice of beds.”).

Louisa Tounsia with gargoulette

Louisa Tounsia was born Louisa Saadoun in 1905 in Tunis. She had a prolific career and recorded for the likes of Gramophone, Columbia, Polyphon, Perfectaphone Baidaphon, Pacific, and Ducretet-Thomson. Her repertoire was equally varied, recording taalil (with Raoul Journo), tango, and yes, a song about heroin. She performed across North Africa and France at the hottest North African cabarets throughout the 1930s and after the war. She was married to the equally impressive Tunisian lyricist Zaki Khraïf. The circumstances of her death have always been unclear to me, having died rather suddenly at the age of sixty-one. If anyone has more information about the final years of her life, please do reach out.

In the meantime, her legacy lives on. Emel Mathlouthi, the singer of the recent Tunisian revolution, has taken to singing Louisa Tounsia’s Ala bab darek on a number of occasions.

Hatikvah in Tunis: A Rare 1930s Recording Surfaces

Mea culpa. I’ve been slow on posts this year. To make up for this absence, I’m going to use Hanukkah as an excuse to shine a light on some of my favorite North African recordings on Youtube. In the spirit of the holiday, I’ll be posting once a day for all eight days of Hanukkah. Why am I turning to Youtube? Well, buried on the video sharing site are some real musical gems that don’t always get the circulation and attention they deserve due to either creative orthography or because titles are written in Arabic or Hebrew. Indeed, each one of these records on Youtube has a story and over the next week or so I’ll be teasing that out and putting them in their historical context. I’ll try to keep these posts short and really place a spotlight on the music.

Perhaps we should start with a question: What did Hatikvah, the Zionist hymn-turned-official anthem of Israel, sound like in Tunisia circa 1932? Well, thanks to this impossibly rare Gramophone recording from Tunis by a Mr. Cohen, we know that it was pretty rocking.

You can compare it to this Alma Gluck (soprano) and Efrem Zimbalist (violin) version, recorded in 1918 for Victor, which I imagine many of my readers will be far more familiar with.

Courtesy of Sephardicmusic.org

In the last few years, I have by and large written about North African Jews who recorded in Arabic but we should not forget that a plethora of languages were committed to disc in the Maghrib - including Hebrew. In terms of their Hebrew output, North African Jews not only released liturgical music on the major labels but so too, comic songs, and as we’ve already heard, Hatikva (meaning “hope” in Hebrew and also the name of the Zionist anthem). In addition to Mr. Cohen’s version (which you’ve now hopefully played multiple times), Babi Bismuth and Messaoud Habib, two of the biggest Tunisian stars of their generation, released their take on the original 1897 nine-stanza poem by Naftali Herz Imber in 1926 for Pathé.

What is remarkable about all of this is just how uncontroversial the release of Hatikvah in North Africa was at the beginning of the twentieth century. First, Hatikvah, which obviously pre-dated the founding of Israel and thus carried different connotations, could be heard in Tunisia for some time. We even have accounts of mixed Muslim-Jewish orchestras performing it in places like Sousse as early as 1917. Second, the recording industry across the Maghrib was used to handling this kind of musical diversity. In the 1932 Gramophone record catalogue for Algeria and Tunisia, then under the direction of Mahieddine Bachtarzi, we find the artist Louisa al-Israiliyya (Louisa “the Jewess,” and listed in later catalogues as Louisa al-Djaziriyya or Louisa l’Algérienne), who was described as the most “respected maalema” in Algeria, while Mr. Cohen’s Hatikvah appears on the same page as recordings by the Soulamia sufi brotherhood of Nabeul and Mohamed Triki’s al-Islamiyya orchestra (also known as La Musulmane), which had just released their recording of another anthem - the Beylical hymn.

In far more recent years, there have been calls in Israel to make the current, shorter version of Hatikvah inclusive of all of the state’s citizens. One wonders if setting it to the rhythms, instrumentals, and vocal flairs of Mr. Cohen’s version from Tunisia might be (at least) a step in the right musical direction.

Celebrating Life: Saoud l'Oranais, Algerian Music-Making, Yom Kippur, and Eid al-Kabir

Box labeled "Saoud l'Oranais" and filled with Algerian 78s

On Monday July 13, I left a blisteringly hot Marseille bound for Montpellier. I was heading there to meet a Mr. Sultan about a collection of “oriental” records he was looking to part with. Upon arrival at Mr. Sultan’s apartment, a friendly-faced nonagenarian greeted me, welcomed me in, and poured me a much-needed glass of water. He pointed me to a table on which sat a small box and a plastic bag, both dangerously packed with Algerian 78 rpm records, and we began to talk. Mr. Sultan, originally from Oran, was in the process of moving into a retirement home, he told me. His children were uninterested in the ancient discs and so he was looking to give (sell) them to a good home - someone who appreciated their value. The records in his collection were his father’s - a man, who judging by the condition of these records and confirmed by Mr. Sultan, was serious about his music. As he spoke, I carefully pulled out record after record for inspection. Most were in their original Pathé and Polyphon sleeves and most reflective of an Oranais musical sensibility. Among the lot was Lili Labassi, Cheikh Zouzou, and of course, Saoud l’Oranais. It was the latter, Mr. Sultan made clear, that his father was particularly fond of. Indeed, the box in which all of the records had sat for way too long contained a single mark designating its contents: on the cover Mr. Sultan or his father had written “Saoud l’Oranais” in a now-faded blue ink. I closed the box, reorganized some of the other discs, gently packed them into a record bag, and bid Mr. Sultan farewell - likely for the first and last time. My heart raced the whole train ride home knowing what was inside my bag.

Since that fateful encounter with Mr. Sultan, I have been thinking much about Saoud l’Oranais. I have of lately been writing about the way in which the Second World War collided with North Africa and North African music-making and no such story is complete without mention of Saoud l’Oranais. But his life was much more than his end and I want to first sketch out the details of that rather remarkable existence before doubling back to how it was cut short and why I’m posting this now.

Saoud l'Oranais, Baidaphon, 1935

Saoud l’Oranais was born Messaoud El Médioni in 1886 in Oran. He came from a long line of musical Medionis and it appears that he first recorded for Pathé at the age of 26 (the first mention of Saoud l’Oranais is in a Pathéphone catalogue from 1912). To give you a sense of that early Algerian recording world he inhabited, that same 1912 record catalogue featured Ed. Yafil (Edmond Nathan Yafil) singing and Mouzino described as “éleve de Sfindja” - a student of the great Andalusi master who still needed to be listed according to his lineage. Throughout the 1910s and through the 1930s, Saoud performed regularly with El Moutribia, Algeria’s premier indigenous (and most Jewish) orchestra. He was first bestowed the title of cheikh sometime in the early-1920s and by the end of that decade, he served as President of the Société de Chant in Oran. He collaborated with José Huertas while in Oran and also served as the director of the Mouloudia, Oran’s premier “oriental music” society. Saoud was happy to bring his children into the music business and recorded with his son Henri and managed to have his son Georgeot record for Parlophone at the age of 12. His most famous musical descendent, his nephew Maurice El Medioni, is of course, still very much alive and remarkably, still performing.  

Sadia Bendenoun (student of Saoud)

 Among his many accomplishments were his musical protégés. Indeed, he took a chance on a blind Jewish girl by the name of Sultanta Daoud and soon turned her into Reinette l’Oranais. On Reinette’s earliest recordings, the announcer would belt out, “Istwanat Polyphon…Reina…éleve de Saoud.” The “éleve de Saoud” brand was a powerful one and would be attached to a number of musicians throughout the 1930s.

Saoud recorded prolifically. His music could be found on Pathé, Polyphon, Parlophone, HMV, Philips, and Baidaphon. His range was rather remarkable as well. He sang gharnati, hawzi - as well as lighter songs about Oran’s championship soccer team. When he wasn’t singing, he managed his own bar, Café Saoud, in the Derb, Oran’s Jewish quarter.

Sometime in the second half of the 1930s, Saoud made his home in Marseille. This was likely done out of opportunity more than anything else. Indeed, Saoud would join a steady flow of North African Jewish and Muslim musicians who made the metropole their base in the 1930s. Like in Oran, Saoud operated a café in his newly adopted city.

And then in June of 1940, Saoud suddenly found himself behind enemy lines. The German occupation of northern France had ushered in the rise of a collaborationist regime, known as Vichy, based in the country’s southern half and including Marseille. From here things get murky. What life was like for Saoud and his family during those years is unknown although surely it was terrifying. Then, on the evening of January 22, 1943, but a few months since Operation Torch and after a massive roundup of Jews in Marseille, the Germans deported Saoud, his son, and too many others to Drancy, the internment camp just outside of Paris. From there, Cheikh Saoud l’Oranais, now once again Messaoud El Médioni - for few would have recognized him, was sent to the Nazi death camp at Sobibor. On March 23, 1943, Saoud and his son Joseph, age 13, were murdered.

 

In some ways, it is easier to dwell on his death than on his exceptional life. His recordings, although once everywhere, have become scarce. Thus, I’m posting something from the recently acquired Sultan collection so that we may honor that life. Given that it is both Yom Kippur and Eid (at the time of writing), I thought his “Idd El Kebir (Eid al-Kabir)” recorded in the late 1920s for Pathé was more than appropriate. Let us remember that this recording comes from a time when North African Jewish musicians like Laho Seror and Mouzino performed at mosque dedication ceremonies, when Ramadan evenings were spent at the casbah cafes and music venues of Jewish performers like Sassi Lebrati, and when Jews like Saoud l’Oranais sang about Muslim holidays like Eid al-Kabir.

  

May Saoud’s memory be for a blessing and may that blessing carry us through this next year.

Mediterranean Musical Trajectories: Judah Sebag and a Rare 78 RPM Recording of Adon Olam

l'Alcazar as it once was

This is a post about the global Mediterranean. It is about Marseille, France serving as a hub of North African music in the era of decolonization. It is about surprising partnerships engendered by the pioneering work of the Armenian-owned record label Disques Tam Tam. Finally, it is about a rare 1950s 78 rpm recording of Judah Sebag performing “Adon Olam,” the liturgical poem chanted weekly in synagogues around the world.

Although many of the details here are obscure, we can begin to trace the trajectory of Judah Sebag. Born in Morocco, Sebag likely made his home in Marseille sometime in the 1950s. There, in the Cours Belsunce quarter, he would have found a space long home to North African cultural production. Indeed, it was here, at l’Alcazar, that Julie Abitbol earned a name for herself some two and half decades prior and became known professionally as Julie Marseillaise (her daughter Widad eventually married the Tunisian artist Hédi Jouini but I’ll save that for another post).

Bobo musicians from Burkina Faso on Tam Tam

In the heart of Cours Belsunce, at 9 Rue Des Dominicains, Sebag would have found the Armenian-owned Disques Tam Tam. So too did other Moroccan Jewish musicians, including but not limited to Abraham El Fassi and Jo Amar. At the Disque Tam Tam studio, Sebag teamed up with a small orchestra consisting of oud, darbouka, and qanoun. Who knows, perhaps the West African and Armenian stars of Tam Tam were milling about when Sebag began to warm up.

Sebag recorded at least two records for Disques Tam Tam but likely a few more. You are about to hear an exceedingly rare 78 rpm recording of Judah Sebag performing that staple of synagogue service, Adon Olam. While Arabic-language North African 78s are difficult to come by, Hebrew-language discs are that much more scarce, so this is a treat. And I have to admit, that Adon Olam, originating sometime in the fifteenth century and meaning “Master of the Universe,” has never quite sounded so good as it has when put to mid-century Moroccan rhythms - despite some surface noise.

I’m not sure what became of Judah Sebag but if any readers out there have any leads, please do send them my way. In the meantime, wishing everyone a Shabbat Shalom.