Najm Allal ( ar, الناجم علال, born 1966) is a singer, guitarist and writer of lyrics in Spanish from

Western Sahara Western Sahara ( '; ; ) is a disputed territory on the northwest coast and in the Maghreb region of North and West Africa. About 20% of the territory is controlled by the self-proclaimed Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR), while the ...

Biography

Life

He was born in a

nomadic A nomad is a member of a community without fixed habitation who regularly moves to and from the same areas. Such groups include hunter-gatherers, pastoral nomads (owning livestock), tinkers and trader nomads. In the twentieth century, the popu ...

family at the ''Ued'' Hawa, near

Smara Smara ( ar, السمارة ''as-Samāra'', also romanized ''Semara''; es, Esmara) is a city in the Moroccan-controlled part of Western Sahara, with a population of 57,035 recorded in the 2014 Moroccan census. It is served by Smara Airport and Sm ...

(Western Sahara) in 1966. All his brothers and sisters do poetry, and his brother Mohamed Lamin and Najm were musicians. His father worked in a Spanish company who constructed a road in the zone. In 1975, he fled with all his family to

Tifariti Tifariti (Berber: Tifariti, ar, تيفاريتي) is an oasis town located in north-eastern Western Sahara, east of the Moroccan Berm, from Smara and north of the border with Mauritania. It is part of what Polisario Front calls the '' Liberated ...

, then Mahbes and finally

Tindouf Tindouf (Berber: Tinduf, ar, تندوف) is the main town, and a commune in Tindouf Province, Algeria, close to the Mauritanian, Western Saharan and Moroccan borders. The commune has population of around 160,000 but the census and population ...

. The next year he started school in the

Sahrawi refugee camps The Sahrawi refugee camps (also romanized with Saharawi) in Tindouf, Algeria, are a collection of refugee camps set up in the Tindouf Province, Algeria in 1975–76 for Sahrawi refugees fleeing from Moroccan forces, who advanced through Wester ...

. He takes secondary education in Algerian high schools. When he finished his studies, he had to do

military service Military service is service by an individual or group in an army or other militia, air forces, and naval forces, whether as a chosen job ( volunteer) or as a result of an involuntary draft (conscription). Some nations (e.g., Mexico) require ...

, where he learned the accordion and acoustic guitar. He subsequently joined the SPLA in 1986, as part of the Sahrawi

military band A military band is a group of personnel that performs musical duties for military functions, usually for the armed forces. A typical military band consists mostly of wind and percussion instruments. The conductor of a band commonly bears the ti ...

. In 1990 he was intended to the frontline, where he composed his first hit and one of his most known songs "''Viva el POLISARIO''" ("''Long live the POLISARIO''"), where he describes the conquest of a Moroccan position.Nar – Nayim Alal
Nubenegra.com

Career

In 1997, he was moved back to

, where he joined the musical agrupation of the

Wilaya A wilayah ( ar, وَلاية, wālāya or ''wilāya'', plural ; Urdu and fa, ولایت, ''velâyat''; tr, vilayet) is an administrative division, usually translated as "state", "province" or occasionally as "governorate". The word comes fr ...

El Aaiun Laâyoune ( , also , ) or El Aaiún ( , ; Hassaniya Arabic: , romanized: ; ber, ⵍⵄⵢⵓⵏ, Leɛyun; ar, label=Modern Standard Arabic, Literary Arabic, العيون, al-ʿUyūn/el-ʿUyūn, lit=The Spring (hydrology), Springs) is the la ...

in the Sahrawi refugee camps, as he left the Army. That year he got in touch with the people of the Spanish music label Nubenegra, and he started to collaborate as guitarist in many editions of the label, most notably on the v.v.a.a. album '' Sáhara tierra mía'' ("''Sahara land of mine''"). That album contains "''Viva el POLISARIO''" and another of his most known works, the theme "''Canta conmigo''", ("Sing with me"). He also joined the Sahrawi band Leyoad in 1998, touring Europe with the band that year, and again in 2002 presenting the album '' Mariem Hassan con Leyoad''. In 2003, he released his first solo album, ''Nar'' ("''Fire''"), sung in

Arabic Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walter ...

, and giving more protagonism to his electric guitar, in a similar way as the

Mali Mali (; ), officially the Republic of Mali,, , ff, 𞤈𞤫𞤲𞥆𞤣𞤢𞥄𞤲𞤣𞤭 𞤃𞤢𞥄𞤤𞤭, Renndaandi Maali, italics=no, ar, جمهورية مالي, Jumhūriyyāt Mālī is a landlocked country in West Africa. Mal ...

blues groups. He is considered one of the innovators of Western Sahara's traditional music, the "'' Hawl''". His work has been added to the World Music National Geographic database. The character of some of Allal's lyrics is highly charged politically; this reflects political uncertainties which

has faced in recent years.Nayim Alal – National Geographic World Music
/ref>

Discography

Studio albums

* 2003 ''Nar''

Featured in

* 1998 ''Sáhara tierra mía'' (CD 2 of '' Sahrauis: The Music of the Western Sahara'') * 2002 '' Mariem Hassan con Leyoad'' * 2004 ''Medej – Cantos antiguos Saharauis'' * 2007 ''Hugo Westerdahl – Western Sahara''

References

External links

Official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Allal, Najm Sahrawi singers People from Smara Living people 1966 births Spanish-language singers Blues guitarists Sahrawi dissidents