The Sudan Handbook

252 thE sudan handbook

musical tastes; Reggae, Hip Hop and Congolese music have become

a feature of social life in neighbourhoods such as Mayo, Angola, and

Mandela, where the majority of southern and western Sudanese congre-

gated. But the most important development in recent years has been

negative. The rise of Islamism has produced an assault on popular

culture, beginning with Numeiri’s 1983 September laws and culminating

in a series of public order laws enacted by military regime of Omar

Al-Bashir in the early 1990s under the auspices of what the Islamists

called the ‘cultural project’. The establishment of an Islamic state in the

Sudan entailed, among other things, the eradication of social and cultural

practices deemed ‘un-Islamic’. These laws were reinforced by a special

unit of the police force. Zar was banned; dress codes were imposed; songs

had to glorify religion and the war in the south. Women could not dance

with men. Wedding parties required a permit. Singers were routinely

beaten up, detained, and persecuted. Video and music cassettes of songs

mentioning physical contact between men and women, or alcohol were

confiscated and erased.

Sudanese music has also lost one of its most distinctive features, the

large orchestras in which a wide range of instruments were used. The

orchestra has gradually been replaced by the synthesizer and the organ,

which depend on a single player. Sudanese media channels pay little

attention these days to the advance of African music on the world stage,

even from the neighbouring region of the Sahel. On Sudanese radio and

TV it is rare to see or hear artists as Youssou N’Dour, Baaba Maal, or

Salif Keita. And in Sudan, in the past two decades, the production of

original and high quality music has virtually disappeared. The majority

of the singers of the golden era have passed away or retired. And the

new generations have confined themselves to the reproduction of music

of the earlier periods.

Recommended Reading

Al Fatih, al-Tahir. Ana Omdurman: Tarikh al-Musiqa fil Sudan. Khartoum: al-

Nashir al-Maktabi, 2003.

The Sudan Handbook, edited by John Ryle, Justin Willis, Suliman Baldo and Jok Madut Jok. © 2011 Rift Valley Institute and contributors

(www.riftvalley.net).