Sheikh Imam: Voice of Dissent
Kerning Cultures
Kerning Cultures Network
4.9 • 529 Ratings
🗓️ 27 May 2022
⏱️ 45 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
A blind oud player from humble beginnings, Sheikh Imam's destiny changed drastically when he met a dissident poet called Ahmed Fouad Negm, and they formed a duo. Together, they would go on start a new era in Egyptian popular music. Their songs would shake regimes, travel the world on cassette tapes, and transcend their own time to become part of the soundtrack to Egypt's revolution decades later.
Today, the story of Sheikh Imam: the Egyptian singer who became an icon of dissent.
This episode was produced by Nadeen Shaker, Heba El-Sherif and Alex Atack, and edited by Dana Ballout. Fact checking was by Deena Sabry and sound design, music and mixing by Monzer El Hachem. Voice over by Eihab Seoudi, and translation help from Maha El Kady. Cover art by Ahmad Salhab.
The songs you heard on this episode were composed and performed by Sheikh Imam and written by Ahmed Fouad Negm and Zein Alabidin Fouad. Lyric translations were by Ahmed Hassan and Elliott Colla.
Fill out our listener survey here (it'll only take 5 minutes!)
Support this podcast on patreon.com/kerningcultures for as little as $2 a month.
You can find a transcript for this episode at our website, kerningcultures.com/kerningcultures.
Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | I'm going to be able to be able to be |
| 0:03.7 | predictable they've seen it happen |
| 0:04.8 | and one story that always kind of captures my imagination |
| 0:07.8 | I'm an experiment |
| 0:08.8 | the streets lost culture |
| 0:11.9 | and you're listening to Kernan Cultures |
| 0:14.9 | I'm Dana Balutz and this is Kernan Cultures, |
| 0:23.1 | stories from the Middle East and North Africa |
| 0:24.9 | and all the spaces in between. |
| 0:28.7 | Back in the 1960s, the El Mugie household in downtown Cairo |
| 0:32.4 | was famous for its parties. |
| 0:34.5 | At least once a week, a crowd would cram into its living room. |
| 0:37.9 | My grandmother's living room would take like, squeeze together maybe like 20 people. |
| 0:45.5 | And people were like quite comfortable sitting on the floor or outside the room or whatever. |
| 0:53.4 | But the room itself, I think, would take like 15, 20 people at most. |
| 0:58.9 | Sahad and Mugi was just a young girl then, but she remembers the room well, |
| 1:02.7 | and she remembers how it would fill up with poets and artists and intellectuals. |
| 1:07.5 | Writers, people from the radio. |
| 1:10.1 | And then, after everybody had arrived, |
| 1:12.5 | these two figures would usually stand up in the crowd. |
| 1:15.1 | One of them would pick up Aouds, |
| 1:17.1 | and the other would pull out a poem he'd prepared. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Kerning Cultures Network, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Kerning Cultures Network and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.