Ghalia Benali is a Belgian born Tunisian artist, who grew up in the latter country surrounded not only by the pillars of Middle Eastern music, but also by French Chanson and Bollywood music. After returning to Belgium as a young adult, Benali realized her potential as an artist of the modern day, and her position allowing her to bridge cultures.
Benali is not only a singer and composer, but a dancer, writer and actress - you can most recently see her in As I Open My Eyes (2015), a coming of age film revolving around the Tunisian music scene. Benali above all claims to be a storyteller, telling "the story of the human soul".
Benali has an impressive amount of releases and collaborations under her belt, including with Hungarian Roma (gypsy) band Romano Drom, and an album of Oum Kalthoum covers. She has most recently embarked on a project called "One Hour Before the Gods Awake", which blends old mythologies and legends about humanities origin with more contemporary versions. In this venture, she has veered musically more towards electronic production, aiming to create Arabic music that conveys messages about "neo-existentialism."
Ghalia Benali is bringing this project to Egypt for the first time, and will be playing at Cairo Jazz Club on March 22nd. She will be accompanied by Ayman Asfour on violin, Ayman Mabrouk on percussion, Ali Al-Bayati on qanoun, and Pascale Snoeck on electronics.
