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Malika Zarra
About Me
Moroccan world jazz singer/composer/producer, Malika Zarra is a multi-cultural shape-
shifter, an enchantress who leaps effortlessly between seemingly unconnected languages
and traditions, uniting them while utilizing each to further enrich the others. The
exotically beautiful artist with the velvety, sinuous mezzo-soprano voice has
demonstrated a rare ability to communicate both powerful and subtle ideas and feelings in
French, English and Moroccan Arabic. Christina Roden
The lines between Middle Eastern music and jazz are there to be drawn. Ornette Coleman
has played with the Master Musicians of Joujouka, and Pharoah Sanders recorded an album
with Maleem Mahmoud Ghania, of the Gnawa tribe. Now, Moroccan vocalist Malika Zarra is
arriving at this crossroads from the opposite direction, infusing the music of her native
culture with jazz. Her self-released debut CD, On The Ebony Road, mixes rhythms from
chaâbi, Berber and Gnawa music with jazzy improvisation and smooth, seductive vocals.
Phil Freeman