Sudan band's music empowers sidelined ethnic group - in pictures

"Beja music is the window to the struggles of its people"

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  Noureddine Jaber plays a song during rehearsals at a studio in Omdurman, the capital Khartoum's twin city, on May 18, 2022. - Noureddine Jaber, a musician with a unique part-guitar, part-tamboura instrument, is giving voice to Sudan's long-marginalised eastern communities through a new album. Hailing from the Red Sea city of Port Sudan, Jaber belongs to the Beja people, a group of nomadic herders and breeders with unique languages, culture, food and music. (Photo by Median Yasser / AFP)

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  He plays a unique 'tambo-guitar', an instrument he fashioned from a guitar neck and his father's vintage tamboura, a type of lyre played in East Africa. Jaber's invention is embossed with small shells and a map of Africa.

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  Hailing from the Red Sea city of Port Sudan, Jaber belongs to the Beja people, a group of nomadic herders and breeders with unique languages, culture, food and music.

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  'Beja music is the window to the struggles of its people,' said Jaber, who named his six-member band Dorpa, which means 'the band of the mountains' in Bedawit, a Beja language. 'The Beja have long been marginalised and we are trying to convey their voice through music.'

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  Beja musicians regularly face restrictions, with authorities often stopping their performances. 'It could be for anything, lack of permits or because the audience were mixed groups' of men and women together, in contrast to those of Arab performers, Jaber said.

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  Abdelhalim Adam, the band's bassist, is originally from the ethnic Folani tribe of the Darfur region and, for him, joining the band was particularly meaningful. 'The Beja's struggle is similar to our tribes in North Darfur,' Adam said. 'They are as marginalised.'

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  As Beja tribes continue to call for wider representation, Jaber has zeroed in on music as his avenue to highlight the struggles of his people.

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  'It is an effective way for our story to travel and attract the world's attention,' he says. And it is also a way 'to preserve our heritage'.

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