.
.
.
.
.
As you know, celebrations are erupting in Cairo’s Tahrir Square and in other areas today as the Egyptian Revolution has finally ended the thirty-year rule of President Hosni Mubarak. After eighteen days and, according to Human Rights Watch, more than three hundred deaths, the power of the people is on full display. The deafening cheers of the crowd celebrate the unseating of a leader who has been in power longer than I have been alive.
As it turns out, UC Irvine Professor and author of Heavy Metal Islam, Mark LeVine has been in Egypt the past few days to witness history and to record it in song. Keeping friends abreast via Facebook, Professor LeVine wrote on Tuesday, “hooked up with ramy essam, the egyptian singer, with whom I am recording a song produced by my good friend anton pukshansky.” Essam took the slogans of Tahrir Square and performed a stirring song there exactly one week ago on Egypt’s “Day of Departure” protests.
To listen to the LeVine/Essam remix in progress (as well as a video of the original with English language translations) visit the OC Weekly’s Heard Mentality blog for my latest featured post. Every great revolution needs a great song and this is it!
http://blogs.ocweekly.com/heardmentality/2011/02/uci_prof_remixing_the_song_of.php
You can also read LeVine’s Al Jazeera article “Twenty-eight hours in Tahrir” here:
http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/02/2011211182045814921.html