Aswat Almadina: the spearhead of Sudan’s new revolution music
“There isn’t a single person in Sudan who hasn’t heard us,” declares Aswat Almadina’s lead singer. Ibrahim Ibn Albadya has now had to reluctantly flee his country, but the band still resounds Sudan’s call for peace.
Aswat Al Madina, meaning ‘The Voices of the City’, are a four-piece band making surprisingly lively music in contrast to the war taking place on its doorstep. Coming together in 2014 against the backdrop of an oppressive dictatorship, their powerful music has carried Sudan through its revolution in 2018 and its subsequent war. Alongside 3.5 million others, the quartet have been forced to leave their homeland and are now scattered across Kenya, Egypt and the UAE.
The group’s contemporary sound combines familiar Middle Eastern folk riffs with elements of urban pop and upbeat jazz. Their gentle Sudanese Arabic vocals often platform new singers, and always highlight social issues plaguing the nation – earning them appointment as National Goodwill Ambassadors in the UN Development Programme.
Their music hasn’t stopped, but the band’s creative output has definitely slowed down since their displacement. Their political voice had been so eminent in the years they had been active in Sudan that putting out songs without a social message would not suit their artists.
“Music, being a musician, is not just a trade. It’s a calling. It’s power”.
Ibrahim Ibn Albadya
“When you understand that this power comes from the people, you can’t do it randomly anymore,” Albadya told Pan African Music. Every song is a decision, a responsibility”.
The band’s vocalist revealed that his voice seldom stopped at just music: “We were creating messages that people used during protests. People chanted our lyrics in the streets. That’s how powerful it was.” The intention was not to make revolutionary music, but the people took their sound to mean something. Albadya would rather make something political than nothing at that time: “I decided I couldn’t stay silent.”
Aswat Almadina refrained from silence during the country’s dictatorship, which proved costly. The band’s fragrant expression against corruption and injustice captured the attention of Supreme Leader Omar al-Bashir’s security forces, who ended up detaining and beating Albadya. Concerts were cancelled, death threats were received, but music was still reaching the people. A movement is hard to stop once its resonance has reached even the most remote areas of Sudan.
Nowadays, Sudan’s sounds are alive and well in hip pockets of Kenya, a country that has embraced its refugees and their culture. Rahiem Shadad, a curator who used to run Khartoum’s Downtown Gallery, said: “Most of the Sudanese people that relocated to Nairobi are cultural professionals, which translates into the type of impact they are creating.”
Tibian Bahari, a mixed media artist, told OkayAfrica: “As we’re all integrating within Nairobi, the art has been heavily influenced by community and peace-making.”
Albadya’s exile, his confrontation with bloodshed, and his efforts to begin anew have “shaped how I write, how I perform, how I connect with people.” Although the band has not foreseen any live performances until “a #ReturnHome concert” in Khartoum, according to their Facebook page, Albadya still keeps busy in his new city.
He now works to preserve Sudan’s traditional instruments, documenting pieces of Sudan’s musical history since a lot of artists have lost their lives or their voices during the war. But after the war is done, he muses, “A new generation will carry the message.”
