Read about El Gusto in the New York Times!
By Elaine Sciolino // Published: October 12, 2012
PARIS — The musicians of the Casbah of old Algiers were bent and broken by history. The bars and cafes that flourished under French colonial rule were their livelihood, so the war that brought independence in 1962 meant the end of their way of life — and of their distinctive music.
The Jews among them fled to France, never to return. Muslim residents of the Casbah, the crumbling, old, lower- and working-class neighborhood, were relocated by the new Algerian government to housing developments on the outskirts of the city.
The musicians lost contact. The Algerian version of the popular Arabic-language music known as chaabi was forgotten.
Now, 50 years later, they are together again. On the evening of Sept. 30, 20 of them bewitched an audience of 900 in the outdoor courtyard of the Museum of the Art and History of Judaism in the heart of the Marais neighborhood here…{read more}
Between 2006 and 2008 I had the opportunity of spending a year in Algiers working with the Chaabi musicians, underground since the revolution of 1962, for the documentary film ‘El Gusto’ – an Algerian ‘Buena Vista Social Club’. I arranged, orchestrated and rehearsed 46 Algerian musicians, prepared them for a European tour in which the music was used in the film.