Live Music

A couple nights ago I went out to the theater with Imad's mom to watch traditional live Moroccan music. There were three different styles of music: Andalusian, Isawa of Rabat and music from the north mountainous region of Chefchaouen. The video below is the Chefchouen and Andalusian musicians playing together at the request of the audience.

The theater was sold out, but in true Moroccan style, the performance started about 45 minutes latae. We arrived at 7:30, a half hour before start time because there weren't assigned seats so we wanted a good place. There were probably about 20 people max in line when we arrived. Finally, they opened the doors at about 7:45 and it was hilarious to me because even though very few people were there waiting in line, everyone was still pushing to get through the door and running to the theater to get the best seats. A line is not a line in Morocco without pushing and forcing your way to the front. Imad's mom told me to run run run to get to the theater first because she overheard another woman saying she was going to get the best spots and reserve a bunch for her friends. So I ran and I was probably the 8th person in the theater so needless to say, we got good seats!

I loved how lively the performance was, people singing along to the music, clapping and enjoying every moment. The music was religious, it was recently a Muslim holiday celebrating the birth of the Prophet Mohammed, so many songs paying homage to him. Music, as in most cultures I know of, is so important to Moroccan culture. People love music and dancing. For the most part, you would rarely see men and women playing music together which is why I loved this performance the best where two of the groups came together and for this song it really felt like everyone in the entire theater was singing along.