Current Issue

What's inside?

Share |

Download from iTunes
RSS Feed

Marrakech and the Sahara

Morocco

9 days - September 22-30 2012

With its red walls, shady palms and maze of packed streets in the souk, Marrakech is a world away, although only three hours by plane. Known as ‘Morocco City’ by early travellers, Marrakech has been a meeting and market place for nearly a thousand years. At its heart is the market place – the Djemaa el Fna – an open-space with a continuous flow of people, food stalls and in the late afternoon and evenings a bewildering range of acrobats, drummers, dancers, musicians, storytellers and snake-charmers.

Morocco

On this trip, you’ll get to hear the various styles of regional music, meet the musicians and, over the Atlas, get a real taste of desert culture on the edge of the Sahara. As well as the historic monuments of Marrakech, we visit the astonishing mud-brick kasbahs in the Atlas and get an unforgettable first-hand introduction to Morocco’s extraordinary musical culture.

All Songlines Music Travellers will receive an information sheet about the local music, plus recommended recordings and DVDs.

Morocco Itinerary

Day 1 Thurs

On arrival in Marrakech, we check in and have an introductory chat with our Travel Leader. In the evening you can head for the Djemma el Fna, the vast main square of old Marrakech, where you can get a thrilling first taste of the city’s music scene amongst the musicians, jugglers, healers and magicians. We suggest eating near the hotel and afterwards enjoying a musical soirée in which Gnawa musicians and dancers will give an introduction to their bluesy, sub-Saharan musical traditions. These will be intimate performances with explanations of instruments and songs.

Day 2 Fri

After breakfast, a tour of the old city. Our guide will collect you from the hotel and lead you on foot through the narrow streets. This is essentially an orientation tour to give you some idea of what is where in this fascinating maze of narrow streets. After a break for lunch we will visit an instrument-maker in the old city. Music and traditional crafts come together in Morocco. The remainder of the afternoon is free to wander at will, do some shopping or visit some of the city’s spectacular architectural attractions. After dinner there’ll be a trip to hear live music in the trendy Gueliz district, after which you can party late at the many clubs in the area.

Day 3 Sat

Today is at leisure in Marrakech to perhaps visit the Jardin Marjorelles, the famous blue garden. Alternatively your tour leader can arrange a day out to Imlil in the High Atlas. It’s the Berbers, not Arabs, who are by far the majority population in southern Morocco. After a walk to the village and a picnic lunch, Berber musicians will be able to give you a taste of their celebratory ahouach music with their own string and percussion instruments. The evening is free for you to use as you wish. Our Travel Leader can make dinner suggestions for you and we suggest a return visit to the Djemaa el Fna where the music will already start making much more sense than it did two days ago.

Day 4 Sun

We leave Marrakech after breakfast and take the Tizi n’Tichka pass through the Atlas mountains, winding past tiny Berber villages clinging to the slopes. On the other side we descend to Ouarzazate, the gateway to the desert and Morocco’s film capital for desert movies. A walk around town before our evening meal.

Day 5 Mon

Today our road runs south towards Zagora and as the landscape changes, so does the music. In the afternoon we reach the village of M’hamid at the edge of the Sahara. We spend the night with nomadic ‘Blue Men’ at their desert camp, sleeping under the stars in bivouacs made from mud and camel wool. The villagers will join us to share their songs and drumming around the campfire showing us some of the music associated with the rituals of camel caravans of days gone by and performing dances such as the ‘guedra’.

Day 6 Tues

We board our vehicles and continue deep into the desert and to the magnificent dunes of Erg Chegaga. The music here is the gentler ‘kasbah’ music and features more melodic stringed instruments – guitars, tidnit and whatever else the musicians can lay their hands on! We camp in nomad-style tents and there is the opportunity to take a camel ride across the dunes (optional).

Day 7 Wed

After breakfast we leave our desert camp and head north, retracing our steps to the main road, and in the late afternoon, we reach Ouarzazate once more.

Day 8 Thurs

Today we retrace our steps back over the High Atlas. However there is one last treat in store as we make a detour to the spectacular Kasbahs of Aït Benhaddou and Telouet. The former has frequently been used as a film location, the latter, built by the powerful Glaoui family of Berbers, was the setting for an unusual story at the end of World War II. Rejoining the main road we head back on the plains and into the city of Marrakech.