Wa Maret El Ayam /Hakam Aleena El Hawa

The cultural legacy Oum Kalthoum holds in Egypt and the wider Arab world is impossible to overstate. Beloved by heads of state and the general populace alike, she epitomised Egypt's post-colonial cultural renaissance, earning the titles ‘The Voice of Egypt’, ‘Star of the East’, and ‘Egypt's Fourth Pyramid’. A contralto – the lowest register of the female voice – the resonance of Kalthoum's voice was such that it was necessary for her to stand three feet away from her microphone. Her career spanned 50 years, and four million people were said to have attended her Cairo funeral procession in 1975, her death considered a national tragedy.

Born in 1898 in the village of Tamay e-Zahayra, Oum Kalthoum initially learnt to sing by eavesdropping on her father's lessons to her older brother, Khalid. Displaying exceptional talent from an early age, she was trained to recite the Qur’an by her father, an imam, and reputedly memorised the entire text. At the age of 12, she was invited to sing in the family ensemble, and would perform onstage in a boy's cloak and Bedouin head covering, to disguise her gender. The 16-year-old Oum Kalthoum would be discovered by the singer Mohamed Abo Al-Ela, who taught her classical Arabic repertoire.

Moving permanently to Cairo in 1923, she signed a deal with Odeon Records, and by 1926 was the highest paid artist in Egypt. By the early 1930s, her success and popularity were such that she conducted an extensive tour of the Middle East and North Africa, performing in Damascus, Baghdad, Beirut, Rabat, Tunis and Tripoli. In 1935, Oum Kalthoum began performing regularly, on the first Thursday of every month on Radio Cairo. She maintained this monthly appearance for forty years, ending in 1972. During these performances, which typically continued into the early hours of the morning, the streets of Cairo were famously empty, as the population remained home and tuned in.

Kalthoum was still at the height of her powers when recording Wa Maret El Ayam (1970) and Hakam Aleena El Hawa (1973). Remastered and reissued on vinyl by Souma Records, these two late-period recordings, are extended compositions split across two sides of vinyl. The former, which translates as ‘And the Days Passed’, is a product of Kalthoum's collaboration with the prolific Egyptian composer Mohamed Abdel Wahab, who was widely revered as an innovator of contemporary Arabic music, and writer of nationalist and revolutionary songs. The union, which began in 1965, between Oum Kalthoum and Abdel Wahab – known as ‘The Clouds’ Rendevouz’ – was urged by Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser, and yielded ten compositions. Abdel Wahab's then-controversial inclination towards Western musical structure is present in the lengthy multi-part form of Wa Maret El Ayam, which begins with a striking prelude based on a Libyan folk melody. The quintessential Egyptian string orchestra and percussion section blends with accordion and electric guitar, with occasional interlocutions on ney flute, the piece moving through a multitude of non-regional rhythmic modes.

Hakam Aleena El Hawa (‘We’re in the Hands of Love’) is a similarly intricate and multilayered piece, composed by Baligh Hamdi – with whom Oum Kalthoum was rumoured to have had romantic ties. Written in the classical Arabic mode maqam nahawand, the piece is a beautifully melancholic ballad, with extended instrumental dialogues between the string orchestra, traditional oud and qanun, and modern electric instruments. Of the latter, a particular highlight is the Farfisa organ introduction by a young Hany Mehanna, himself a pioneer of oriental synthesisers.

Both recordings showcase the incredible breadth of Oum Kalthoum's emotional and musical range, and exemplify the qualities that have enraptured generations of listeners. Sweepingly romantic and yearningly wistful, these albums are essential works in the 20th-century Arabic music canon.