EDMOND YAFIL AND ANDALUSI MUSICAL REVIVAL IN EARLY 20TH-CENTURY ALGERIA

In: International journal of Middle East studies: IJMES, Volume 44, Issue 4, p. 671-692

Abstract

AbstractEdmond Yafil was a key figure in the early 20th-century Algerian revival of Andalusi music, a high-prestige urban performance tradition linked to medieval Muslim Spain. Yafil's experiments with printing, transcription, audio recording, amateur associations, concert-hall performance, and new composition helped transform the production, consumption, and circulation of Andalusi music. Although Yafil was widely respected, his reputation was fraught with ambiguity during his lifetime and has remained so since. While not divorced from his position as a Jew in turn of the century Algiers, Yafil's ambiguity is best understood within the context of the complex Andalusi musical milieu of his day. This study of Yafil shows revival to have been a gloss for a partial but far-reaching shift in the social basis of Andalusi music making and calls for a broader rethinking of the familiar concept of revival in North Africa and the Middle East and beyond.