Fes Festival in the City - Mehdi Abdou and Mohammed Anbari

Crowds began gathering at dusk in Bab Boujloud Square for the Sunday night Festival of Sacred Music’s free public concert, featuring Casablanca based singer / songwriters Mehdi Abdou and Mohammed Anbari; backed by the same diverse and talented band as the previous evening, with accordian, keyboard, backing singers, percussion and string sections.

Mohammed Anbari

Mehdi Abdou

Festival in the City
Boujloud
The Golden Heart : Mehdi Abdou

Mehdi Abdou is an interpreter, composer and painter who says his sole objective is to transmit his art with sincerity. He studied under great musicians such as Mohamed Abdelouahab, Baligh Hamdi and Mohamed Al Mouji. At the same time, he rubbed shoulders with men of letters and philosophy, among them Ihssane Abdelkoudouss, Youssef Idriss and others, which helped round out his personality.

He studied at the Conservatory in Casablanca and then travelled to Cairo to refine his talent. He spent 12 years there and visited many other countries so that he could share his art at international festivals like Mawazine, Jarash, Volubilis and Rabat. He composed songs for himself and other artists as well as for film scores and advertisements.

He is an artist in perfect harmony with his time. His appearance, his precision and his intelligence contribute to a personality dedicated to his artistic work of music and painting, believing that art can be a mirror.

Mohammed El Anbari
Graduate of the Institut Provincial in Meknes, this talented singer as taken part in many national and international festivals. His latest appearance at the Festival of Carthage won him the prize for best song.

As production manager for the event, Khalid Malik, explained, “these singers are popular because of the quality and meaning of their lyrics. Theirs isn’t so much dance music, although they do play lively songs that excite their audience. But their intelligent messages about life, freedom and positivity are for listening to, and particularly appropriate for the Sacred Music Festival.’

Both singers were indeed highly engaging. Mehdi Abdou’s opening set’s ‘hip hop’ elements had the audience cheering and responding. Mohammed Ambari smiled throughout his closing set, clearly enjoying the enthusiastic responses of the audience and interacting with the talented backing musicians.

Text and photographs: Gabe Monson 

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