In Memoriam Samy El-Bably, master of the trumpet.
February 2001. On the way from his birthplace to the capital of Cairo, the greatest trumpet player from Egypt was involved in a car accident at age 66. His nickname: Samy El- Bably.
Technically, the trumpet is too limited to play microtones on it. That is why the instrument is really kind of unsuitable for Arabic music. With the exception of military music and the street wind bands (such as those of Hasaballah in Cairo), the trumpet is nowhere to be found in Arab music. Trumpet lessons were not given at the Egyptian / Arab music schools until recently. Samy El- Bably eventually managed to tame this wild instrument. Thanks to a unique lip and blowing technique, a rich musical fantasty and improvisation, Samy has made the trumpet speak Arabic. The great Egyptian composer Mohamed Abdel-Wahab said about that: "Samy’s trumpet sounds like an Arabic violin". Other known Egyptian musicians praise Samy’s trumpet as "unearthly, particularly sensitive, almost unrecognizable, a trumpet as you have never heard".
Samy recorded a lot of film and TV music and worked together with many Egyptian stars. However, he is mainly known for his cooperation with Egyptian folk singer Ahmad Adaweya in the 1970s and 1980s.
Because of the cooperation with the roots band of Egyptian Mahmoud Fadl, Hossam Ramzy and Natacha Atlas, Samy El- Bably also broke through into the international world music scene.
In Soundhopper, we play different examples of his solos and recordings from the 1970s to 2000s.
