When the name of Laila Abdulaziz is mentioned, you are in front of a pioneering Kuwaiti woman who has won the title of first on more than one artistic level. She is the first Kuwaiti composer, the first Kuwaiti artist to meet the planet of the East, Mrs. Umm Kulthum (in 1968), the first Kuwaiti scholarship to Egypt to study music academically, the first Kuwaiti artist to present melodies to Arab singers, the first Kuwaiti to support sports with singing and composing, and the first Kuwaiti female voice to present the song Al-Haditha on stage, and the first Kuwaiti woman to sing in Europe, and obtain membership in the “Association of World Authors and Composers” in Paris. Therefore, it was not surprising that the former Kuwaiti Minister of Information, Sheikh Jaber Al-Ali Al-Sabah, called her "Kuwait's first artist", and that the press called her "Dana Al-Kuwait", devoting long pages to talking about her.
Her career was not a bed of roses. She faced many challenges in the way of achieving her artistic dreams that she had pursued since her childhood. At the age of six, she was eager to study music and play, and for that she went to the goldsmith's market to sell the gold jewelry that her father gave her to buy the accordion, which caused her mother to revolt, who saw her behavior as a matter that requires reprimand and punishment. However, it was fortunate for her that her father, the merchant, had a different opinion, which was to encourage her to choose what she deems appropriate for her. While she approved of her father's supportive stance and was enthusiastic about moving forward in the world of playing and singing, she clashed with the restrictions and traditions of society, which at that time forbade girls to even think of entering the world of art, and considered it shameful, let alone taking art as a profession.
At the time, girls who liked singing had no choice but to join popular women's wedding bands, such as the "Umm Zayed" and "Awdat Al-Muhanna" bands. However, Laila Abdelaziz's ambitions were greater than the participation of a group of chanters in presenting collective traditional songs and beating the tambourine. That is why she was determined to overcome this challenge by highlighting her talents through school music lessons.
Laila Abdulaziz Ali Al-Hamar was born in 1947 in the American Hospital in the Al-Qibla district of Kuwait by an Indian doctor named Laila. She studied elementary school at Khadija Bint Khuwaylid School, and secondary school at Al-Mirqab Secondary School for Girls. In these two schools, her teachers noticed that she had unique talents in singing, playing, acting, and percussive dancing, so they encouraged her and took care of her artistically. Indeed, the headmistress of her secondary school, Ms. Fatima Saeed, predicted for her a brilliant future in the field of music after she I listened to her playing the piano, especially since she had won three medals from 1959 to 1963, for winning the first place in playing, in addition to winning the rhythmic dance medal and other appreciation awards from the Ministry of Education on the annual Flag Day.
After graduating from high school in 1963, she did not find anything to satisfy her artistic craving except to join the “Arabian Gulf Theater” troupe as a member, so she became responsible for music in the Department of Decoration, Sound Effects and Lighting, and a member of the Artistic Production Services Committee. Rather, after one year (1964) she participated in The play “Hunger” was written by Abdulaziz Al-Sorayeh and directed by Saqr Al-Rashoud, where she stood on stage alongside Hayat Al-Fahd, Salem, Muhammad Al-Mansour, Mansour Al-Mansour, Khaled Al-Obeid and Asmahan Tawfiq. The following year, she participated in acting in the play “The Mud”, written and directed by Saqr Al-Rashoud, and represented by Mansour Al-Mansour, Asmahan Tawfiq and Abdul Rahman Al-Saleh.
Fate wants her to receive, in the midst of her theatrical participation, the first shocks in her life, with the death of her father in Britain, while he was there to pursue his business. Here, Laila felt that she had lost her greatest supporter and mentor, so she decided to do what would have made her father proud of her if fate extended his life, which is to complete her studies academically.
In the meantime, she met Kuwait's great artist, Shadi Al-Khaleej, so he took her by the hand and introduced her to the Minister of Education at the time, Sheikh Abdullah Al-Jaber Al-Sabah, who is known for his musical interests. In order to specialize in the Conservatory of Music there.
In Cairo, the capital of arts and crafts, Laila proved her worth with the scholarship that was granted to her, as she devoted herself to studying and training on various musical instruments, and she was able to finish the courses in 3 years instead of 5, and she graduated from the Higher Institute of Arabic Music in 1967, specializing in playing He plays the zither with proficiency in playing other instruments such as the piano, accordion, violin, and lute.
Thus, she returned to her homeland after registering her name in the list of firsts, as the first Kuwaiti and Gulf woman to graduate from the aforementioned institute, to begin the stage of work and giving. At the beginning of her career, she joined the Ministry of Information, and was appointed to the position of “Music Observer” at Kuwait Radio. And while she was at the top of this work, she participated in a number of concerts as a musician, and sang for the first time in front of people the song “He is Sahih Al-Hawa Ghalab” by Umm Kulthum, and she presented a number of programs on Kuwait TV such as: “Amateur Theater”, “With Al-Angham”, and “From the Folklore”, “Television Post”, and “Origin and Image”, and published in the Kuwaiti newspaper “Al-Seyassah” artistic interviews with famous personalities such as the artist Imad Hamdi and the media, Laila Rostom, and she traveled to Iran in 1968 to attend the “Takht Jamshid” festival. There, she met Empress Farah Diba. In addition to the above, she returned to acting in the plays of the Arab Gulf Theater Group, so in 1971 she participated in the play “Men and Girls” directed by Mansour Al-Mansour and represented by Saqr Al-Rushoud, Suad Abdullah, Muhammad Al-Mansour, Maryam Al-Ghadhban, Aisha Ibrahim and Taiba Al-Faraj.
The first song she recorded with her voice was the song “Wide, Wide”, composed by Abdul Rahman Al-Baijan and written by Sheikh Khalifa Al-Abdullah Al-Sabah. As for the first melody I composed, it was for the patriotic song, “Oh my country, I loved your name,” which was sung by singer Khalifa Badr. However, the song that she launched towards fame and stardom at the level of the Gulf and the Arab world is the song “Al-Asmaraniya” from its melodies, lyrics and performance, and it is considered one of the immortal Kuwaiti works of art that is sung in concerts to this day. Perhaps one of the reasons for its success and immortality is that its owner presented it with an innovative melody, a beautiful performance full of movement and joy, and lyrical sentences followed by an unprecedented refrain, which is “woohoo.” This song has a story told by Laila in a television interview, and she said that she returned from Abu Dhabi in the seventies, influenced by what she saw there and what she documented of her popular heritage, so the Minister of Information, at the time, Sheikh Jaber Al-Ali, asked her to record a special song for television, so she suggested that he instead record an artistic evening on A session punctuated by popular dances, in which a group of artists participate, so that each one of them performs a song.
What is known about Laila is her great love for football, and therefore her enthusiasm and encouragement for her country’s national team, Kuwait, which was evident in her leadership of women’s popular teams to the stadiums for encouragement, by virtue of her being the first president of the Football Fans Association in Kuwait, not to mention her composing a number of sports songs such as My songs "Our Team" and "Tighten Your Tricks, O Boy of My Country". As for outside Kuwait, Laila is a fanatical fan of the Saudi club Al-Nasr, for which she sang the song “Hail, our hero, quarter, hail Al-Nasr ** hail those who won the league and the Al-Nasr Cup.” This spherical song has a story told by Laila, saying that she was invited to Riyadh in the mid-seventies to celebrate a wedding. One of the sons of King Saud, may God have mercy on him, and there coincided with her presence when Al-Nasr Club won the cup and the league, so he asked her to present a song for the club as a gift to its president, Prince Abdul Rahman bin Saud, may God have mercy on him, and so it was.
In addition to her love of sports, she loves to travel. She visited many Arab countries, either to celebrate their national holidays or to celebrate the weddings of their well-known families, starting with the UAE, Bahrain and Libya and ending with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, in which she received indescribable respect, generosity, reception and love, according to her words, to the extent that she owned a residence there and lived for a period of time. In it, she travels between Jeddah and Riyadh and has close relations with a number of Saudi families, such as the family of Sheikh Abdulaziz Jamjoom. In the context of talking about her travels, she told us, during her hosting of the “Wink” program on the Gulf Rotana channel, that she was the first Kuwaiti artist to visit Libya at an official invitation from her government and to travel with her band in most Libyan cities to celebrate her national holidays, adding that she met there with the well-known Lebanese violinist Aboud Abdel Aal, who invited her to come to Britain, where he lives and works. Laila said that she felt exhausted from her tours in Libya on board military transport planes over a period of 45 days, so she decided, at the insistence of her band members, to take them and travel with them to London in 1980 to take a break, but what happened is that Abboud Abdel Aal met her there and encouraged her To stay and sing in his hall on Eward Road Street, the meeting place for Gulf and Arab tourists. And so she spent more than a year working there side by side with Arab artists, whom Abdel-Aal was attracting from the likes of Sabah and Faiza Ahmed, with fleeting visits to Saudi Arabia to celebrate wedding celebrations. Due to her long absence from her job at the Kuwaiti radio station and her threat of dismissal, she submitted her resignation. From London, she moved to Paris, where she owned a residence and opened a lounge and a restaurant to present her songs to the Arab public.
Thus, Laila divides her life – according to her statements – on 3 stations: Kuwait (where she is in winter to participate in the season of national holidays), Saudi Arabia (where she is in Mecca and Medina during the month of Ramadan to enjoy their spiritual atmosphere) and Egypt (where she hesitates to restore her old memories and experience the latest artistic developments ).
Her idea of the popular video sessions
Hence, the artist, Laila Abdelaziz, is credited with the idea of the popular lyrical video sessions, with beautiful women's dance paragraphs and well-known collective applause. It is also credited for its steadfastness in the face of the extremist parties that fought it because of the dance segments accompanying the popular sessions.
In her artistic career, Laila presented about 300 melodies, through which she tried to preserve the identity of Kuwaiti music, knowing that she decided since the early seventies to stop singing and content herself with composing, justifying her decision by saying, “I stopped singing because I felt that my artistic formation is more of a composer than a singer,” according to What was reported by the press on her tongue.
Thus, in the list of her works, we find melodies that she gave to Kuwaiti, Gulf and Arab artists, including many songs that she composed for herself and performed with her voice. Among the Kuwaiti artists who sang from its compositions: Hussein Jassem (Dunya Al-Hawa Duet), Abdul Majeed Abdul Qader (My Heart Is Tired), Khalifa Badr (Oh my country, I loved your name), Rashid Sultan (Oh Army of the Arabs), Mubarak Maatouq (Bridge of Light), Yahya Ahmed (Dom Taghla), Ghareed Al-Shati (Look, Donya), Abd al-Latif al-Mansour (Tighten your tricks, O son of my country), Abbas al-Badri (songs “Waves of the Sea”, “Jay Ya’id”, “Yatari Alij” and “Your Heart Doesn’t Show Me”). This is noteworthy that Abbas Al-Badri is more than one who sang her melodies, while Ghazi Al-Attar presented one of her most beautiful romantic melodies through the song “Dunya Al-Hawa”, which she sang by herself and sung by Najah Salam and sung by Hussein Jassim as well.
Collaboration with non-Kuwaiti artists
As for her cooperation with non-Kuwaiti artists, Shadia, Hani Shaker, Aida Al-Shaer, Muharram Fouad, Najah Salam, Imad Abdel-Halim, Iraqi singer Jassim Al-Khayyat, Iraqi singer Lamia Tawfiq, Lebanese singer Samaher, and Yemeni singer Forsan Khalifa sang from her compositions. She also composed for Arab artists residing in Kuwait, such as Morsi Al-Hariri and Houria Sami. She presented 6 melodies to the Emirati artist Jaber Jassim, and two melodies to the artist Abdullah Belkhair, not to mention that she composed musical pieces and soundtracks for a group of television works.
In her press and television interviews, she often complained about the neglect of the audio-visual media for her many and varied works, except for the song “Al-Asmarania”, as if her entire history stopped at this work. And she is correct in her complaint because the list of works that she performed with her voice includes many other beautiful songs, such as: I put you in my heart, you have Dana oh my intention, I am yesterday, oh Saud, oh is the East, she said I forgot passion, we came from Kuwait, oh traveler, you greeted me O Kuwait, greet those who are absent, God is great, my beloved, I have changed, I am a young man over my heart, between you and me is a sea, O guard my heart with his fire, woe from God, I sold and bought, God my dear, an hour has passed, what is the reason, my mind is good from that relief, Excuse the shepherd of passion, oh God comfort the broken mind, that the moon is in the circle of Fintas, oh line, oh busy, do not fear God, I swear by God, we and our nights, tonight is up, what do you think, oh people of passion, oh from Jubailah, and others. This is in addition to the song “Tiny Warr”, which she wrote and composed in Riyadh in 1981, and it spread and artists began to repeat it in their concerts and musical sessions, as one of the folklore songs without any mention of its owner, although it was registered under her name in the International Association of Authors. It is known that the Egyptian artist Saeed Saleh sang "Tiny Warr" accompanied by Lebleba and Younes Shalaby in the movie Al-Ans Station in 1985.
Written by: Dr. Abdullah Al-Madani abu_taymour@