In this paper,
we well survey the complicated dynamics of change and/or conservation within
the repertory of the traditional oral Berber dancing songs called Ahwash,
as this genre is still performed among certain Moroccan Berber-Jewish
communities immigrated to Israel in the mid 1950’s and early 1960’s.
Definition of ‘ahwash’ with
respect to other Moroccan musical genres
The term ‘ahwash’ covers several forms
of local varieties of a Berber village collective dance in which participants, men
and/or women sing while dancing collectively in the Atlas Mountains and around in
Morocco (v. Chottin; Rovsing-Olsen). Despite the lack of a historical concrete picture
of how the Judeo-Berber vernacular variants interfered, each time through
history, in the everyday life of those Jewish communities (v. Zafrani;
Lakhsassi) who lived for centuries in those areas (v. Schroeter), Jewish
participation in ahwash, as dancers, singers and even as lyrics
improvisers, has been witnessed in such localities as Tifnut, Tidili, Ayt-Bouwulli,
Ighil-n-Ughu, etc. (v. Azaryahu; Lakhsassi).
In fact, despite their role in initiating
and developing many musical forms of both urban learned and popular music in
Morocco, namely the popular Shaabi and the aristocratic Al-Ala genres
(v. Chetrit 1998, 2003), and aside the liturgical piyyutim (ex. David
Hassin, David Bouzaglo, Jo Amar), the Moroccan Jewry hasn’t developed
any ethnic lay musical tradition as that was the case for example with the
Hassidim in Eastern Europe or the Yemenites (cf. Shiloah: 269-275).
The point is that while many aspects of
the Moroccan urban music are commonly known to have immigrated abroad with the
Moroccan Jewry, namely to Israel (ex. Sami El-Maghribi, Emil Zrihan, Shlomo Bar) and the
USA (ex. Avi-Eilam Amzallag’s Anda-El
East-West Orchestra), it is only with
Azaryahu’s 1999 MA monograph that we learned recently that the Berber musical
genre Ahwash also had immigrated. On the basis of that comparative ethno musicological
fieldwork, conducted among certain Moroccan Berber-Jews in the localities of Aderet
and Shokeda in Israel and among their old compatriot Moslems in the
Moroccan localities they had come from (Tidili, Igloua, Ayt-Bougmmaz in
the Atlas Mountains), Azaryahu’s work explored the dimensions along which the
new socio-economic and ethno-cultural environment had enforced structural and
functional changes in the ahwash ceremony as performed nowadays in those
Israeli localities. Among those changes: a merge with another Berber musical
genre, the ‘Rways’ instrumental singing music (v. Schuyler), that become
sometimes, with artists like Barukh Ben David (Petah Tikva) or late Shalom
Swissa (Beer Sheva), a mere final episode in an Israeli ahwash
evening (v. Elmedlaoui 2005).
The Ahwash and its
Functions among the Berber-Jews
The “Ahwash”
is a Berber ceremony that contains musical, poetic, choreographic and
behavioral elements, which are typical of the whole Berber musical tradition in
Morocco.(ii) As it is still the case at their original
localities in the Moroccan Atlas Mountains (Igloua, Tidili, Ayt
Bougmmaz), the Berber-Jews communities studied in the field by one of us
(S. Azaryahu) still connect the ahwash ceremony in Israel (Aderet
and Shokeda localities namely) to events of the life cycle such as
weddings and Bar-Mitzvas (i.e. age of religious majority), or to events
of the agricultural calendar, such as the end of the harvest season. It seems
that the “ahwash” ceremony and the Rways instrumental
singing music are the only event from the Berber cultural activities that are
still performed by the Berber-Jews in Israel.(iii)
As it is
reported in Azaryahu (1999), on the basis of a fieldwork in the localities of
origin of the Berber Jews in the Atlas Mountains, the standard Ahwash
ceremony itself is performed in those localities by a group of men alongside a
group of women. This form of staging the performance serves as a mirror through
which we can understand both the relationships, and the hierarchy among the
community members, as well as their artistic cultural-musical aesthetics.
Ahwash as
performed nowadays among Berber-Jews in Israel
With the wave
of emigration of the Moroccan-Jews in general to Israel during the years 1955
-1963, the emerging Israeli culture received, through the Berber-Jews
tradition, a unique addition which, however, has totally failed to be
recognized until today because of the westernized prevailing values (v.
Elmedlaoui 1995, 1999). According to the prevailing official settlement policy
of that time, the Berber-Jews were settled in rural and peripheral areas from
the northern of the country till the south. They were settled in rural places
by the authorities under the pretext that it would be good for them to be
settled in a natural and socio-economic environment as similar as possible to
the one they knew in Morocco. The conventional thinking of the government those
days was that the state prevails and comes first.(iv) And since it was the beginning of the
establishment of the young country, working hands were needed to rearrange the
map of modern Israel. As an unexpected result and byproduct, that
quartering permitted, or even caused the Berber-Jews to maintain some of their
cultural traditions in a communal framework. However, the custodians of this
tradition have become fewer and fewer. And today, this endangered cultural
tradition is in an obvious danger of extinction, since, among other aspects,
only old persons still have access to it through direct memory.
As in most traditional societies, there was, in this community too, a
clear cut division of functions, according to which men were the custodians of
written tradition (sacred music and texts), whereas women cultivated the oral
tradition. Customarily, the latter was considered somewhat inferior (v. Terri Brint 2003, Magrini 2003).
As could be
assumed, the passage of the Jewish Berber community from its native place in
Morocco to Israel resulted in inevitable changes not only within the social
structure of that community, but also in the deep structure of its rituals, the
ahwash ceremony included. Thus, as Azaryahu's fieldwork in both
Morocco (1998) and in Israel (1997-today) revealed it, a rather unexpected
phenomenon occurred with the Berber Jews community’s move to the Israeli
European-oriented culture. On the one side, for example, the Ahwash
ceremony continues to assign the same apparent functions and roles. For
example, the performance continues to involve together both men and women in
singing, dancing, while drums are played exclusively by men. The ceremony
continues also to be connected to the social life cycle and agricultural
season’s celebration. But, on the other side, the status of women within the
community has undergone a radical change in the direction of emancipation. This
status improvement, due to the disintegration of the social hierarchy on which
the canonic ahwash was based, is reflected most clearly in the textual
makeup of the ritual as we well see in the last section of this paper.
Background of an area of
research:
So far, the research of Berber-Jewish culture
has concentrated on social and anthropological aspects of this community and
has not dealt with its musical heritage (see for example: Cohen and
Shiloah 1986). By contrast, the
objective of Azaryahu's 1999 research has been to explore by means of ethnomusicological
tools, the Berber-Jewish musical culture in Israel, and in particular the
changes that their musical heritage has undergone since they immigrated to
Israel. Investigating the Ahwash ceremony was the aim of that
research, with special attention to the following topics:
First, it explored the various
musical aspects of the Ahwash performed by the Berber-Jewish
communities in Israel: preliminary results have shown that the progression of
music matches with and follows the temporal progression of the ceremony.
Secondly, the
research explored the social aspects of the Ahwash, namely: the
inner hierarchy of the musicians who perform the Ahwash, the social
contexts of the Ahwash ceremony - mainly rites of passage, pertaining to
changes of personal status, and the advent of the agricultural calendar. Here
the emphasis lies on the function of the master of the ceremony (called Sheikh
n-uhwash among Berber Muslims in Morocco ) as well as on the role of the
participants in the ceremony as determined by their musical knowledge and
skills.
On the basis
of a comparison with facts observed through the above mentioned fieldwork
conducted in the localities of origin, Azaryahu described the canonic Ahwash
(i.e., Ahwash as performed by the Jews before their emigration to Israel)
consisted of four parts: Agwal, Timawashin, Timsaqin and Tahwashin.
From these four parts, only the Tahwashin, the main part of an Ahwash
event, and a very short version of the Timsaqin are still performed
by Berber-Jews in Israel, because time definition and constraints in their new
environment which, unlike in the past, compelled the participants to organize
the Ahwash in advance within the socio-economic new constraints of
formal defined time. The Agwal traditionally serving as a long
preparatory part, and the Timawashin, traditionally functioning as a phatic
signal for the women to join the ceremony, a signal that is no longer needed,
have been omitted. On the other hand, a new part, the Rways, traditionally
independent as a genre in Morocca, has been integrated to the ahwash as we
pointed it out earlier. The Rways typical content of nostalgic songs and
yearning suits the emotional needs of the community today. But the ongoing
trend to shorten the Timsaqin part of Ahwash among the Berber-Jews
allows us to conjecture about an eventual complete disappearance of the Ahwash
among them. Even so, the intense transmission of intimate messages between men
and women through sung verses continues.
Conclusion and future
prospects
Today, in the
more open Israeli society, the Berber-Jewish community has neglected its
tradition. One of the main reasons is that the old generation is decreasing in
the number of people who still have the knowledge to perform an Ahwash. The
consequence, on the social level, is the disintegration of the social hierarchy
on which the structural makeup of the canonic Ahwash was based. Thus for
example, unlike in the past, women now often take the lead and start the
singing or choose the repertoire of the ceremony.
As a
conclusion, we say that the Ahwash that is performed today in Israel is
clearly revealing the transition that has occurred in this ceremony since
immigration to Israel. The Ahwash has become a symbolic-nostalgic event
that includes the main traditional social-musical structures within a short and
pressed time frame.
The
Atlas-Jewish community in Israel is a typical example of the adjustment process
of immigrant societies in Israel. These communities have lived since their
emigration to Israel in a major conflict between the need to preserve and
maintain their cultural-traditional uniqueness, and their willingness to merge
into the new way of life in Israel, on the other hand. As it is still performed in Israel, the ahwash
ceremony, with its social-cultural and poetic components, compared to its
original contexts in Morocco, reflects clearly these painful conflicts. Azaryahu's
ongoing research program for her PhD is intended to deepen the questions already
raised and to address other ones with more thoroughness regarding both data and
analysis.
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--------------------------------------------------
Endnotes:
(i) A paper presented at MUSIQUES AMAZIGHES ET MUSIQUES DU MONDE: INFLUENCES ET INTERACTION. Colloque organisé, sous le Haut Patronage de Sa
Majesté le Roi Mohamed VI, dans le cadre du Festival
Timitar-3 (Juillet 2006). Agadir, salle de conférences de la Chambre de
Commerce (10 Juillet 2006)
(ii) See namely: Lorta Jacob 1980, Aydoun 1992, Rovsing Olson 1997, Hoffman 2002.
(iii) In fact, the Berber singing among Berber-Jewish communities immigrated to
Israel is not limited to the collective danced singing genre called 'Ahwash'.
The genre 'Rways' (See Chottin 1933, Schuyler 1979, Aydoun 1992,
Elmedlaoui 2006 and (in press)) is also
performed occasionally in a non formal way at the end of some ahwash ceremony
cessions by certain amateur 'rays' like Barukh Ben David, from Petah
Tikva locality who plays the Souss
Berber kind of hurdy-gurdy called 'Rebab' or late Shalom Swissa from Ber-Sheva, great singer and player of the Souss
Berber tetracord called 'Lutar' (see Elmedlaoui 2005).
(iv) On the conflicting aspects that
characterize the Moroccan Jews feeling and sense of identity, see Elmedlaoui
(1995) and (1999).
