Bnat el Houariyat (“the girls of Houara”) is a multigenerational ensemble that follows Moroccan laâbat tradition. These are women’s percussion groups that perform stinging, often humorous songs about daily life, primarily for home weddings and women’s celebratory gatherings. For over 20 years, Bnat el Houariyat have specialized in two local genres, huara (also spelled houara) and chaabi.
Bandleader Khadija El Warzazia is both a traditionalist and an innovator, one of the first women to publicly perform Gnawa music in Morocco, thus incorporating Gnawa spiritual prose in her style.
Khadija’s songs are about romance, personal relations, spirituality, society, and nature, representing the broad spectrum of the feminine experience. The group’s performances inspire the future generations of North African female musicians while giving audiences around the world empowerment to feel uninhibited and entranced by their polyrhythms, call and response techniques, and rhythmic climaxes.
The musical instruments used range from the familiar bendir frame drum and goblet-shaped taarija to the tabsil, a women’s invention using finger cymbals to tap out a high resonance on a tea plate to emulate the sound of the ritual iron castanets called karkabas.
The group is accompanied by the captivating New York City based young dancer Esraa Warda, known for her deeply felt performances of the trance-like jedba hair-swaying dance. She joined Bnat el Houariyat in 2017 when Khadija picked her out of the crowd in a home wedding in Marrakech’s medina. She handed Warda a kaftan and requested that she perform with the group that night. Impressed with her knowledge of Chaabi dance, Khadija recruited Warda as the youngest woman and apprentice of the group.
Author: Angel Romero
Angel Romero y Ruiz has dedicated his life to musical exploration. His efforts included the creation of two online portals, worldmusiccentral.org and musicasdelmundo.com. In addition, Angel is the co-founder of the Transglobal World Music Chart, a panel of world music DJs and writers that celebrates global sounds. Furthermore, he delved into the record business, producing world music studio albums and compilations. His works have appeared on Alula Records, Ellipsis Arts, Indígena Records and Music of the World.