Sahari

The acclaimed Saharawi singer-songwriter and activist Aziza Brahim, returns for her third Glitterbeat album. Produced in Barcelona by Aziza with Amparo Sanchez (Amparanoia, Calexico), “Sahari” is her most adventuresome and sublime work to date.

On the front cover of Aziza Brahim’s new album, Sahari, a young girl poses in ballet shoes and a glistening white tutu. It’s a common childhood scene, but it’s flipped upside down. She’s not privileged and the backdrop isn’t a comfortable suburban home. She’s an exile, living nowhere near her homeland, and behind her stand the tents and buildings of a refugee camp. There’s a desert on the ground and a burning sky above. Yet even in this bleakness, she has optimism. She believes in a better future.

The music Aziza Brahim makes reflects both the sorrow and the hope of these people. She grew up in one of those camps in the Algerian desert, along with thousands of other Saharawi who were removed from their homes in the Western Sahara. The refugee camp was the place that formed her. It lives in her every heartbeat.

“For Sahari, I wanted to find that balance between the past and the present, between African and European music and to reach as many people as possible.” The process was made smoother by having a sympathetic band who’ve been with her for years. All the members played a part in framing the new material.