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Jordan News
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- Jordan News
"The Sun of Lebanese Song" Ignites the Roman Theater with Her Majestic Voice - Jordan News
With her commanding presence and authentic mountain-born voice, the Sun of Lebanese Song, Najwa Karam, took the stage before an eager audience that had long awaited her return—proving that she is not just a singer, but a timeless artistic phenomenon that defies generations. اضافة اعلان In a night charged with emotion and creativity, Karam delivered a blend of her timeless hits and new songs, met with overwhelming interaction from the crowd—an embodiment of her enduring place in the legacy of Arabic music. On stage, Najwa was not simply a performer, but a full-fledged icon—combining voice, charisma, and stage presence to affirm that Lebanese art remains a driving force in the cultural scene despite all challenges. She chose to perform in the Roman Theater, in the heart of old Amman, where the ancient stones still echo with history. The venue wasn't a mere backdrop—it was a central character in the show, brought to life through sound, image, and spirit. The historic site wasn't just part of the view—it helped shape the story. Among these stones, Najwa stood like a continuation of a musical legacy that transcends time. Before her entrance, journalist Lana Qassous introduced the concert with heartfelt words: "Najwa is not just any artist. She's a blend of pride, elegance, and sincerity. She has become the voice of her people and a bridge between tradition and innovation. Every time she sings, joy and love fill the air." To thunderous cheers, Najwa appeared on stage to the tune of her folk song 'Ya Marhaba Ya Leil Ya Marhaba Ya Kell Habbabeh', first released in 1994. She greeted the crowd warmly: 'Good evening, a night of love and joy to you all. Let sorrow stay behind us—because we are children of hope. I always long to meet my beloved audience here in Amman and in Jordan.' The concert was part of the launch tour for her new album 'Halet Taware'' (State of Emergency), during which she performed the title track live for the first time, setting off a wave of excitement, cheers, and dancing from an electrified audience. Despite the modern nature of the show, Najwa did not forget to breathe new life into her classic hits—songs that still resonate deeply, as if they were born yesterday. From 'Law Ma Btekzib', to 'Keef Bdaweek' (1999), 'Noqta Aalsater' (1998), and 'Sho Hal Hala' (2005), she revisited her golden archive, proving that time has only added to its richness and value. The concert was executed with high-level professionalism. Everything was meticulously planned—from audience entry, to stage design that echoed the spirit of the Roman Theater, and lighting that wasn't just illumination, but part of the narrative. The visual setup left a beautiful impression, while the lighting matched every moment—sometimes bursting with excitement, other times fading to let the music speak on its own. The audience was fully energized—thousands inside the venue and many more outside, all there to witness, sing, and live the moment with "El Set Najwa." Cheers, clapping, dancing, and waves of interaction never stopped during the two-hour live performance. From the stage, Najwa shared: 'I've always loved truth, clarity, and heartfelt stands—and tonight, we'll sing those words together.' She then performed 'Aya Ana Baddak', which the audience sang with her word for word, prompting her to perform it again by popular demand. In her usual spontaneous manner, she declared: 'Now it's time to announce a real state of emergency,' before launching into the album's title track amid a storm of cheers and applause. 'I'm going to sing a song I truly love—and I know you love it too—it's practically become a tradition between us,' she said, but before she could continue, the crowd erupted singing 'Khallini Shoofak Bel Leil.' In a touching and warm moment, Najwa performed a mawal (vocal improvisation) for Jordan, her mountain voice brimming with longing—bridging two peoples with a single melody: "Every time, oh Jordan, longing sends me from Lebanon... I speak truth and honesty... Amman, Amman, you are here, oh Amman… every home of yours felt like a Lebanese home to me." This wasn't just a song, but a love letter—crafted by Najwa's voice and echoed by the hearts of the crowd. In the Press Conference: 'Art Is My Mission' After the concert, Najwa met with journalists in a press conference that blended sincerity with spontaneity. Her comments reflected a grounded personality, a deep understanding of music, audience, and the modern artist's role. On her role as an artist and her social responsibility, Najwa said: 'Our job as artists is to spread joy. People need to keep celebrating life—may God take away sorrow and those who bring it.' Asked about announcing her concert through ChatGPT, she smiled and replied: 'Of course artists must stay updated with the times—so they're not left behind. AI is now the vehicle we're all riding. It's a tool, and we should use it, not run from it.' When asked what she hopes people will say about her in 20 years, she confidently said: 'I think my archive speaks for itself. I consider it my legacy—both for today and for the future.' On the concept of strength in women, she replied emotionally: 'Women today are strong and have achieved a lot. I won't say they've achieved as much as men—because men are already a source of strength. But when a woman turns her vulnerability into strength, that's when she's truly strong.' Najwa shared a powerful view on her relationship with music: 'I love to sing—I don't consider it a job. Art is my mission, and I've mastered it.' When asked about her private life on social media, she answered with a grin: 'If all my art and everything I've done isn't enough for people—then that's it. No need to go further. My personal life doesn't have to be on display—it's not the main event.' Asked for a word in the Jordanian dialect, she cheerfully said: 'Allah yehy el-nashama! The Jordanian audience is dear to me—and I can't go long without coming back to hear them and let them hear me.' When asked how it felt to see the Jordanian audience already memorizing her new album despite its recent release, she replied with emotion: 'I loved it—really. That shows the album has succeeded and reached the people—even though it hasn't been out for long.' Regarding possible collaborations with Jordanian artists, she said: 'Why not? In my early career I worked on 6 or 7 projects with Jordanians. If I find a poet or composer who can offer something that suits my voice and style—I'm absolutely ready.' Najwa Karam's concert was not just a musical night—it was a celebration of voice, place, audience, and the kind of authentic artistry that never fades with time. At the Roman Theater, it truly was a State of Emergency—but one of love, music, and enduring hope.
Scoop
15-07-2025
- Climate
- Scoop
Nelson Tasman Region To Transition To Recovery On Thursday 17 July 2025
Tasman Mayor Tim King has given notice that Nelson Tasman will begin a transition period, moving from a state of emergency into a recovery focus, following the impacts from the severe weather the region experienced in June and July 2025. The State of Emergency will expire and The Notice of Local Transition period, under Section 94B of the Civil Defence Emergency Management Act 2002, takes effect at 4.47pm on Thursday 17 July 2025 and ends on Thursday 14 August 2025 unless it is extended or ends before then. Mayor King extended his thanks to all the agencies, community groups and volunteers who had supported the Nelson Tasman Emergency Management response. "For the second time in three weeks we're transitioning to recovery. Our community has faced two major weather events, and we have seen significant impacts across the region. While we are moving from a state of emergency, this transition period means that support continues to be available to those affected. "A big thank you to everyone involved, including the many in our community who have supported, and continue to support, their friends, whānau, and neighbours. "Our partner agencies have once again stepped up to support our communities in times of need. We're especially grateful to those who offered assistance from outside our region, thank you for your continued generosity and commitment." Nelson Mayor Nick Smith was encouraged by the shift to the transition period. "The timing is right this Thursday for us to move from the state of emergency from last Friday's storm to the transition phase of recovery. The major outstanding impact on Nelson is the closure of Rocks Road. Good progress is being made on stabilising the cliff and I am hopeful of it re-opening by the end of the week. Nelson by the weekend will be back to normal and fully open for business.' Using Scoop for work? Scoop is free for personal use, but you'll need a licence for work use. This is part of our Ethical Paywall and how we fund Scoop. Join today with plans starting from less than $3 per week, plus gain access to exclusive Pro features. Join Pro Individual Find out more
New Statesman
25-06-2025
- Entertainment
- New Statesman
4.48 Psychosis is a disturbing dissection of the mind
Photo by Marc Brenner Twenty-five years since it was first staged, the playwright Sarah Kane's final play returns to the Royal Court's Jerwood Theatre Upstairs. Labelled Kane's 'suicide note' by critics (the play was first performed the year after Kane took her own life), 4.48 Psychosis enters into the mind of an unnamed woman struggling with suicidal thoughts, derealisation and poor patient care – horrors made all the more intense by a theatre that sits 80. First performed before sertraline, Prozac and venlafaxine became part of casual conversation, it is no surprise that the play disturbed viewers. A quarter of a century on, it is still disturbing. And it should be. Kane convincingly portrayed the desperation and urgency of suicidal thoughts. The unnamed woman is played by three actors – all of whom were part of the original cast – at times speaking in unison, finishing each other's sentences or contradicting one another. The monologues, though, cannot be taken for delirious ramblings – the play's protagonist is highly intelligent and self-aware, eliciting laughs from the audience. Her erratic moods are only intensified by Nigel Edwards' lighting design: the blue and purple washes, low golden lights, the white and greys of TV static cast over the actors after the main character starts taking her antidepressants. The set designer, Jeremy Herbert, gives the audience an alternative perspective through which to watch: a six-panelled mirror, suspended from the ceiling at an angle. You can choose to see the story unfold in front of you, as you would real life, or watch a distorted reflection of it. 'Hatch opens,' say the actors on numerous occasions. But what do they mean? A moment of clarity and relief amid the anguish? A hatch into Kane's mind in the last few months before she took her own life? Either way, 4.48 Psychosis is a remarkably frank dissection of a mind at war with itself. 4.48 Psychosis Royal Court, London WC2. Until 5 July 2025 [See also: Thom Yorke's Hamlet is brilliantly rendered sacrilege] Subscribe to The New Statesman today from only £8.99 per month Subscribe Related This article appears in the 25 Jun 2025 issue of the New Statesman, State of Emergency
Yahoo
11-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
National Guard deployment in LA shows disregard for victims of deadly St. Louis tornado
Demonstrators protest Sunday outside a downtown jail in Los Angeles following two days of clashes with police during a series of immigration raids. () I've gotten used to sending my sister the same short text every once in a while. 'You guys okay?' She's lived in Los Angeles for more than a decade now, and has experienced enough wildfires and earthquakes that this text has become routine. Fortunately she's stayed safe through all of them, although she did have to evacuate her home during the January fires. I sent another one of these texts Friday night when I saw that protestors in L.A. were clashing with ICE agents who were trying to forcefully deport their friends and neighbors. She is okay, far enough away from the epicenter to stay safe, but the conflict between the People and our federal government has only heightened since then. On Saturday, in a show of brutal force, President Donald Trump signed a memorandum calling at least 2,000 members of the National Guard into service for 60 days to 'augment and support the protection of Federal functions and property,' essentially turning the armed military might of the United States against its own citizens in order to carry out these gutless ICE raids. On Sunday morning, I strapped my son to his little chest carrier and went on a three-mile walk through parts of St. Louis. On a number of occasions, felled trees and torn-up sidewalks blocked my path, requiring me to step onto the street, which is notoriously not very safe for pedestrians. We passed by too many houses and apartment buildings without roofs and even more piles of shattered bricks. Back on May 16, it was my sister's turn to send that familiar text. The tornado blamed for five deaths that devastated our city and region was notable for its destruction, but will remain notable for its lasting impacts. Almost one month later, recovery efforts have barely begun, with city government ill-equipped to effectively manage them and The People's Response needing a desperate infusion of resources and capacity. As both Mayor Cara Spencer and former Mayor Tishaura Jones have rightfully pointed out, this is when the federal government is supposed to step in. Disaster recovery is the rightful domain of FEMA, but their response has been 'slow-walked,' according to Republican Sen. Josh Hawley, who notably voted against funding FEMA in September of 2024, but is now practically begging the feds to come in and do their job. With FEMA funding low and the response time slow, the other tool at the federal government's disposal is the National Guard, which can be called in after a state declares a State of Emergency, just like Gov. Mike Kehoe did on May 19. But the federal government only deployed 40 National Guard members to help with debris clean-up, and only for one week. They're already gone. This juxtaposition of the situations in Los Angles and St. Louis is infuriating, and shows that our federal government under the Trump administration is more willing to deploy resources against its own citizens, rather than to help them. Some 2,000 National Guard troops helping to rebuild in St. Louis would be a godsend. But 2,000 armed National Guard troops protecting ICE agents in Los Angeles is a gestapo. Our federal government has not only turned against its own people, but willfully neglected their most basic duties in the process. SUBSCRIBE: GET THE MORNING HEADLINES DELIVERED TO YOUR INBOX
Daily Maverick
05-06-2025
- Daily Maverick
Rashid Lombard — legendary photographer and jazz pioneer who forged greatness in the struggle
Rashid Lombard, who died at his Cape Town home this week and was buried according to Muslim rites on Thursday, was a legend as a photographer and pioneer of the Cape Town Jazz Festival. Dennis Cruywagen remembers him. Thirty-six years ago, in August 1989, in Gugulethu township, near Cape Town, I watched the highest-ranking Anglican clergyman in South Africa deliberately being teargassed as he resolutely tried to protect young, defenceless pupils from the fury of the riot police. That priest was the leader of the Anglican Church in southern Africa, Archbishop Desmond Tutu. On that day, he led at least 500 pupils who had resolved to show their support for the national defiance campaign launched by the mass democratic movement. The arrival of police derailed their plans. They fled into Holy Cross Catholic Church. When the Arch, as Tutu preferred to be called, arrived, he negotiated what he thought was a safe passage for the young people with the men in camouflage uniforms. The rector of the University of the Western Cape, Professor Jakes Gerwel, was with him. I was there as a reporter for the Cape Argus newspaper. Also, there was the slim, renowned and fearless photographer Rashid Lombard. As usual his black hair was tied in a ponytail. A black beret sat on his head. Black as his hair was his moustache. We watched teargas being fired at the Arch, Professor Gerwel and the teenagers. Young people scattered. On that winter's day in Gugulethu, while many were coughing and trying to wipe away tears, which are wont to flow in a teargas attack, Rashid stood firm. He calmly raised his camera and started taking photographs that would become world famous. He captured on film images of the Arch walking through a cloud of teargas. They were stunning images. He offered his pictures to my newspaper. They were declined because of the State of Emergency press restrictions. The Cape Times used them the next morning. Gutsy deputy editor Deon du Plessis was infuriated that our newspaper had turned down Rashid's pictures. Rashid allowed the paper to use them. They were subsequently splashed across the front page. His evocative pictures moved Cape Town's English-language newspapers to disregard press restrictions. I recalled this event on Wednesday when I was informed that Rashid had passed away at the age of 74. And as the recollections came gushing, I recalled his gentle, kind eyes, visionary and pioneering spirit, and his great love for his wife, Colleen, their children and grandchildren. Colleen, whom he married in 1970, was held as a detainee from 14 August 1987 until 29 January 1988. Not by choice, he became a single parent of their three children, Yana, Chevan and Shadley, for a while, as his ANC courier wife was held incommunicado. I remembered how, between 1985 and 1990, we were part of a group of news people who were reporting on the struggle. It was a job that consumed our lives and forged strong bonds. In this group were news legends such as Jimi Matthews, Adil Bradlow, Benni Gool, Ayesha Ismail, Sahm Venter, Willie de Klerk, Obed Zilwa, Eric Miller, Guy Tillim, Mike Hutchings, Azziz Tassiem, John Rubython and many others. It takes the death of a former colleague to bring back their names and the times in which we lived and reported on. To me there was a common belief that held us together: we wanted to tell the story of the struggle, the bravery of people – many of them so very young – yet not enough to stop state-sanctioned violence gleefully delivered by cruel men. We were the witnesses; Rashid's camera faithfully recording this infamous history. A lover of jazz who went on to pioneer the Cape Town Jazz Festival in post-apartheid South Africa, Rashid and I teamed up for an interview with uMkhonto weSizwe chief of staff Chris Hani. After the unbanning of the ANC, the charismatic leader and other exiles returned home. On his first open visit to Cape Town, a senior ANC member called me. I was informed that Comrade Chris would be meeting senior newspaper executives at the University of the Western Cape. I was not on the guest list. Miffed, I called Buyiswa Jack, a former detainee incarcerated under section 29 of the notorious Internal Security Act, which has mercifully been repealed, to apprise her of the situation. She contacted her brother, Pro Jack, who was assassinated years later, his killers never apprehended. I was sitting in the Argus newsroom when I was called, instructed to bring only Rashid along, and meet Pro in front of the Langa Post Office. The MK legend, Hani, had insisted that Rashid be the photographer, even if he was not an Argus staffer! Such was his reputation. We spent more than an hour interviewing Hani. The next day the Cape Argus had a poster that alerted readers to an exclusive interview with Hani. Rashid's pictures were used. Reminiscing about past stories and scoops, I went to my bookshelf and retrieved a slim publication, To the Moon and Back: A Detention Memoir. Years ago, I bought the book with the purple-blue cover at Clarke's Bookshop, an institution on Cape Town's Long Street. The author is Colleen Lombard, Rashid's widow, and fellow jazz aficionado. She was arrested with her friend and comrade, the late Zurayah Abass, as they tried to smuggle Nicklo Pedro (also late) and Yasmina Pandy across the border. During her detention she came close to taking her own life, while at home Rashid was taking care of their three children. Those were very hard years. The book, which was a project that Rashid strongly believed in and supported, was first published in 2021. Colleen wrote it 10 years after her incarceration and subsequent court appearance as an accused in what became known as the Rainbow Trial, which started in the Supreme Court in February 1989, a year before Nelson Mandela was freed from jail. The Western Cape's last so-called terrorism trial, it spluttered on until March 1991 when all charges were withdrawn against the accused. In 2014, the national government recognised Rashid's enormous contribution to the reopening of the rich well of jazz music in South Africa and awarded him the National Order of Ikhamanga in Silver for his excellent contribution to arts and culture and his dedication to jazz music. That was a richly deserved honour. Rest well, Rashid. You were a legend. You were on first-name terms with great men and women who recognised your greatness, yet you never lost the common touch and your humility. DM
