We are now in Cairo! After a ten hour flight we were greeted at our hotel with mizmar, trumpets and drums. These guys played for about an hour and made us forget all about our jet lag!
The director of our ensemble, Scott Marcus, had arranged for the mizmar player Kamil Mitwalli (featured in the above video) and his zaffa (wedding procession) band to greet us. Scott has worked with Kamil on previous research trips to Cairo and he has written about him in his book Music in Egypt.
Thank you so much for this great account of the MEE Egypt trip. It's wonderful! I especially enjoyed the "Welcome to Cairo" video showing your joyous arrival at the Safir Hotel. I can't wait to see what comes next! Keep posting.
ReplyDeleteKenta Duffey Tully (Kat's Mom)