{"id":2041,"date":"2020-06-26T11:33:18","date_gmt":"2020-06-26T09:33:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mapamundimusica.com\/?p=2041"},"modified":"2020-07-03T14:48:51","modified_gmt":"2020-07-03T12:48:51","slug":"the-brave-blind-girl-who-turned-into-more-than-a-little-queen-reinette-lorainese","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mapamundimusica.com\/en\/musicbeforeshabbat\/the-brave-blind-girl-who-turned-into-more-than-a-little-queen-reinette-lorainese\/","title":{"rendered":"The brave blind girl who turned into more than a little queen: Reinette l’Orainese"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

26th June 2020 \u2013 Shabbat is almost here<\/strong><\/h4>\n

And on this occasion we will enjoy the outstanding singer, composer and oudist Reinette l’Oranaise, born in 1918 in Tiaret, Algeria.<\/h3>\n

<\/p>\n

I discovered this artist while learning more about my much appreciated\u00a0singer and pianist Maurice El Medioni. He\u00a0has collaborated with Reinette on many occasions. About Maurice, and also about his uncle, Saoud l’Oranaise, I will come back in future editions of MBS, as they are also benchmarks of the Jewish music from the North of Africa. In this meantime, it is the turn for this superb artist\u00a0that I think deserves a prominent position in the Olympus of music.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n
\"Forward<\/a><\/td>\nForward this to a friend, right from here<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

The brave blind girl who turned into more than a little queen<\/h3>\n

Reinette’s life could have had the same destination as Saoud’s:\u00a0she could have ended her days in Sobibor. But no. Her fate was another. Her life continued until she died in Paris in\u00a01998. In this picture, from the blog\u00a0Ben Zaken Descendance<\/a>, Maurice El Medioni is with her. He is alive and 91 years old.<\/h6>\n

<\/p>\n

\u00b7 At the bottom you’ll find the video with her voice \u00b7<\/strong><\/h5>\n

Reinette, whose real name was Sultana Daoud, was\u00a0born in 1918 in Tiaret<\/strong>, 220 kms to the East from Oran, in Algeria. She was the daughter of a Morrocan rabbi.<\/p>\n

The infection of smallpox made her\u00a0blind from 3 years old<\/strong>. But it did not prevent her\u00a0study music with the mentioned\u00a0Saoud El Medioni<\/strong>. According to\u00a0Gharamophone<\/a>, Maurice sais the little Sultana was Saoud’s first pupil.<\/p>\n

The young Sultana\u00a0learnt to play darbouka as well as\u00a0oud<\/strong>\u00a0 that, at that time, was an instrument exclusive for male performers.\u00a0She also\u00a0learnt also many pieces from the\u00a0Arab Andalousi<\/strong>\u00a0legacy, of which she is considered one of the referential keepers, without whom many pieces would just have got lost.\u00a0This is especially thrilling for me, as the land where I am settled and from where I am writing to you now was that Al Andalus, that land where that music\u00a0took its first shape, the\u00a0music she would play and sing five\u00a0centuries after the Moorish and the Sephardic Jews were expelled from.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

This picture is from the same blog as the one above –><\/p>\n

Reinette and Saoud were inseparable. She was his taliba<\/em>, his pupil, and\u00a0she used to sing in his cafe in the Derb, Oran’s jewish quarter<\/strong>.\u00a0In 1938, with the\u00a0shaykh<\/em>, the master, she\u00a0moved\u00a0to Paris<\/strong>, where he was going to set up\u00a0a cafe in Montmartre. But he would send her back to Algeria very soon, encouraging her to make her name in her country. He did well. In January 1943 the German army, after the Operation Torch, made a\u00a0roundup of Jewish in Marseille’s port and deported Saoud<\/strong>\u00a0and his 13 years old son Joseph to Drancy camp and later to Sobibor, where they would be murdered.<\/p>\n

If you want to know more about the Jewish musicians from the North of Africa, check the work\u00a0Jews, Music-Making, and the Twentieth Century Maghrib<\/a><\/em>, by\u00a0Christopher Benno Silver.<\/p>\n

What happened with Reinette back in Algeria?<\/h3>\n

Back in Algeria,\u00a0her popularity started to rise<\/strong>. She would perform regularly in Radio Alger, she joined the female orchestra of Meriem Fekkai\u00a0and she would collaborate with the most relevant musicians at that time. But in\u00a01962, after the independence of Algeria<\/strong>, as well as more than one hundred thousand Jews, she had to leave the country and moved to France. There, she performed for the Jewish community from the North of Africa.<\/p>\n

Only 23 years after her exile in France, she would get some attention from the media. According to the\u00a0beautiful\u00a0obituary<\/a>\u00a0by Philip Sweeney, some journalist from the newspaper Liberation realized about her. This would rekindle her sweetest moments.\u00a0She would perform again in great theatres, she would be admired and she would end her days recognized as a cultural ambassador of her country, Algeria.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n
\"Forward<\/a><\/td>\nForward to a friend, right from here<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n\n\n\n
\"Share<\/a><\/td>\nShare to your Facebook, right from here<\/a><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

Click the picture to listen to Reinette l’Oranaise<\/em>:<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n