Special report

Band of Gnawa

‘70s rock revival in Essaouira

Essaouira 

28/06/2007 - 

One of the highlights of the 10th Gnawa Festival in Essaouira, Morocco, was the creation of Band of Gnawa, an ambitious project masterminded by one of the festival’s artistic co-directors, Loy Ehrlich. The idea is to revive 70s rock classics with a Gnawa spin, drawing on local traditional influences and psychedelic rock. A compelling mix!

The winding streets of the medina in downtown Essaouira pulse with music day and night as record shops blare the latest sounds from their speakers, in the hope of drawing in passing tourists from Spain, France, Italy, the U.K. and the U.S., not to mention local Moroccans. This year, The Gnawa Festival in Essaouira drew a record crowd on its tenth anniversary (450,000 people in four days). The festival, which has been dubbed the "Moroccan Woodstock", has become a regular fixture on the international calendar and a big favourite with the neo-hippie generation keen to relive a certain ‘70s vibe.

The Moroccan fishing-port of Essaouira has always been a cultural melting-pot, open to influences from the rest of the world. Over successive generations, the Gnawa (descendents of black slaves from the southern Sahara) fused elements of their cultural heritage with Berber and Arab-Muslim tradition. And in the ‘70s international hippies flocked to Essaouira to tap into this rich cultural mix and enjoy the local surf and the cool sea breeze. Jimi Hendrix himself dropped into Essaouira for a whirlwind visit in 1969 and became a local legend, remembered for generations to come.

Moroccan rock haven

In 1971, a young musician by the name of Loy Ehrlich discovered Essaouira, Morocco’s rock’n’roll haven where the streets vibrated to the sound of Hendrix, Led Zeppelin, The Beatles and The Stones morning, noon and night. Essaouira’s pivotal position as an open door onto Africa greatly influenced Ehrlich who went on to become a seminal fusion pioneer, mixing Western and African sounds. In the course of his career Ehrlich, currently renowned as a core member of the Hadouk Trio, would play with West African Cosmos, help Touré Kunda to make a name for themselves on the international scene and hone his musical skills with an extended stay in Réunion.

This year, together with the Gnawa Festival’s other artistic co-directors Karim Ziad (from Algeria) and the Moroccan mââlem Abdleslam Alikane, Ehrlich brought his unique fusion vibe to Essaouira. Each of the festival’s co-directors put together a group to mark the festival’s tenth anniversary and Ehrlich’s band, made up of regular festival performers, tapped directly into Essaouira’s ‘70s vibe, putting an interesting Gnawa spin on psychedelic rock classics from the era.

After a week’s artistic residency in Essaouira, the musicians involved in Band of Gnawa got together for their first full rehearsal at a riad belonging to the local music institute. Here, in a room hung with colourful Berber carpets and tapestries, drummer Cyril Atef, guitarist Louis Bertignac, singer Akram Sedkaoui and Loy Ehrlich (on piano and bass) joined forces with Saïd Boulhimas playing the guembri (the traditional three-stringed instrument used in Gnawa music) and a group of young Gnawa armed with an impressive selection of rattles.

Band of Gypsies

Whipping up a fast and furious fusion of rhythms, Ehrlich darted between keyboards and gumbass (a Gnawa bass he invented himself) while Bertignac launched into a series of wild guitar solos as the band of Gnawa rattle-players took their cue from Atef pounding out his incredible beats just behind them.

Striking up the chords of the Hendrix classic Who Knows, minds inevitably cast back to the famous Band of Gypsies that the legendary left-handed guitar hero set up in 1969. Tiring of his showman extravaganzas with The Jimi Hendrix Experience, Hendrix branched out in a new psychedelic funk direction with his Band of Gypsies who appeared at Woodstock in 1969 with Mitch Mitchell (drummer from The Jimi Hendrix Experience). Mitchell was replaced by Buddy Miles for four historical concerts on 31 December 1969 and 1 January 1970 and Hendrix’s all-black band went into the studio to record an explosive album at the end of January 1970.

Over thirty years on, Ehrlich’s Band of Gnawa performed their first concert at the Essaouira Festival on 21 June, taking to the main stage on the Place Moulay Hassan after the crowd had been whipped into a frenzy by the Gnawa rhythms of the talented young mââlem Hassan Boussou. Then, as the stiff sea breeze whipped across the square, the musicians of Band of Gnawa leapt on stage for a rousing version of The Beatles’ Come Together. This was followed by a series of superb reworkings of Led Zeppelin and Jimi Hendrix classics. Then, Atef, Bertignac, Sedkoui and Ehrlich left the stage and let the Gnawa musicians enjoy the spotlight. The foursome eventually returned to the stage for another set fusing squealing rock guitars with African and Moroccan influences and Gnawa trance. For the time being, apart from their appearance at Essaouira and a single concert date in Paris (at Le Cabaret Sauvage), Ehrlich’s Band Of Gnawa have no plans for the future. But, who knows, this infectious psychedelic rock/ Gnawa trance mix could soon catch on with wider audiences and generate its own album? Inshallah!

Eglantine  Chabasseur