Exotic sounds of Egypt

SOURCES AND IMAGES: HOTWIRE MARKETING, TUTONE COMMUNICATIONS

For the first time in South Africa, Egyptian singer and composer Dina El Wedidi will be gracing the Baxter Theatre Centre with her unique style, fusing local Oriental and global forms of music.

She will be joined on stage with an ensemble of six accomplished musicians.

Dina was chosen in 2012 by renowned Brazilian music icon Gilberto Gil to spend an extended mentoring period with him as part of the Rolex Mentor and Protégé Arts Initiative. Dina met
her mentor while touring the United States, Switzerland and Brazil and they performed together in Egypt and Italy, as well as at Back2Black, which was part of the London 2012 Festival.

ROLEX ARTS WEEKEND

Dina is one of more than 200 renowned artists and arts leaders from SA and around the world who gathered at the Baxter Theatre Centre in February 2020, to attend a prestigious Rolex Arts Weekend. Rolex is a firm supporter of the arts with their additional Mentor and Protégé Arts Initiative.

Established in 2002 to assist in the transfer of knowledge from one generation of artists to the next, the mentoring programme is based onthe belief that art is a continuum, an accumulation of past experiences over generations, and that all are inspired by those who went before them. In keeping with the Rolex tradition of encouraging individual excellence, younger artists of exceptional promise – the protégés – are given the rare opportunity to spend significant periods of time in creative exchange with world-renowned creatives in their particular field – the mentors – on a one-to-one basis.

THEATRE TROUPE

After graduating with a degree in Oriental Literature from Cairo University in 2008, Dina discovered her passion for music when she joined the El-Warsha Theatre Troupe. Here she learned to sing a wide variety of traditional genres with the help of her tutor Maged Soliman. She then left El-Warsha to explore the full potential of her voice and has since partaken in various projects with international artists.

In 2011 she founded her own band, focusing on singing and composing then in 2012 went on to represent Egypt in The Nile Project, a musical collaboration bringing together 14 musicians from different African countries.

Dina released her first album in 2014, Tadewar w Tergaa (Turning Back) and her second in 2018 called Slumber, which cleverly sampled train station sounds as background music. In 2019 she was chosen as one of Time magazine’s Next Generation Leaders.