Songs in the key of my life: Umm Kulthum

I've always been interested in the music of other cultures and fascinated that there are far more different musical concepts than what we know from our Western education and musical traditions. The problem is that it's difficult to find literature and examples for such music (but the internet has made it incredibly more easy by now). A friend of mine, an acclaimed mathematician, who I meet only occasionally (and haven't seen in many years now) once invited me over to his place having a few drinks after going out to eat. He had a disappointedly small record collection (maybe 10 records), but there was one album that caught my eye, obviously of Arabic origin. It was by the Egyptian singer Umm Kulthum, and my friend explained to me that he had once heard her songs in a special radio show and fell in love with her music. The same happened to me, when he played the record for me. It took me years to find out about her and to get a cd of her music. One reason alone was the fact that her name is spelt in various variations including Om Kalsoum, Om Koulsum, Om Kalthoum, Oumme Kalsoum and Umm Kolthoum. I learnt that she was and still is the most beloved and honored singer in the complete Arabic world. Wikipedia says: "More than three decades after her death, she is widely regarded as the greatest female singer in Arab music history." and adds a quote from Virginia Danielson:"Imagine a singer with the virtuosity of Joan Sutherland or Ella Fitzgerald, the public persona of Eleanor Roosevelt and the audience of Elvis and you have Umm Kulthum".

I haven't mentioned a specific song, since I really couldn't pick one out, but there's another reason: her songs are not what we would expect of a song, the duration is not fixed and is measured in hours rather than minutes. Therefore they are better called 'epics' than just simply 'songs'. Of course the topics are as in most cultures about love and longing and loss, but as an outsider listening to her I can only get a grasp of the music itself. I guess you can say that her music is based on old traditional Arabic music and her style was to improvise at great length. She'd take a phrase and repeat it over and over and over, varying slightly in color and tone and creating a sort of ecstatic frenzy in the audience. It is said that the audience often requested that she repeat such 'sequences'.

I recommend to read the quite informative Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Umm_Kulthum