NABLUS (AFP) — From Jamal Hemmou’s ramshackle workshop in Nablus’s Previous Metropolis within the West Financial institution, basic Arabic songs blare into the encompassing cobbled streets.
The 58-year-old is the final of his sort within the metropolis — he runs the one store in Nablus repairing and promoting vinyl data and gamers.
Like a lot of the world, Nablus is attuned to digital music, however Hemmou informed AFP working with vinyl was about preserving Palestinian “heritage.”
Aged individuals usually cross by on the finish of the day and, “once I activate the report participant, they begin crying,” he mentioned.
Hemmou started studying find out how to restore report gamers when he was 17, listening to the nice Arab artists of the time as he labored.
“I’ve extra expertise than the individuals with the certificates,” he joked, including that he’s fully self-taught, and purchased his ardour for music from his father. “My father was a singer, he used to sing as a result of he liked these previous singers… nearly everybody in my household is a musician,” he mentioned.
Jamal Hemmou checks an vintage gramophone (phonograph) report participant in entrance of his store within the West Financial institution metropolis of Nablus, January 17, 2023. (JAAFAR ASHTIYEH / AFP)
Hemmou mentioned he enjoys Lebanon’s Fairuz and Egyptian famous person Abdel Halim Hafez, however his favourite is Shadia, an Egyptian diva who launched a string of hits between the Nineteen Forties and Nineteen Eighties.
“She sang from the guts, she sang with emotion, she informed a narrative,” he mentioned.
Strewn all through his workshop, in varied phases of restore, are report gamers from the Sixties and Nineteen Seventies. There are even a number of gramophones from the Nineteen Forties. He estimated that he sells a median of 5 report gamers per thirty days.
‘You’re transported again’
As violence within the West Financial institution has soared in current months, Hemmou mentioned it’s not IDF raids that harm enterprise — it’s the strikes usually known as by native authorities in response to Israeli operations.
“We shut all of the retailers when the Israeli raids kill somebody in Nablus, particularly the Previous Metropolis,” he informed AFP.
Jamal Hemmou shows previous report gamers in entrance of his store within the West Financial institution metropolis of Nablus, January 17, 2023. (JAAFAR ASHTIYEH / AFP)
For Hemmou, the machines and the music they play are extra than simply songs, they’re a vital a part of Palestinian and Arab heritage.
“Whenever you play the report, you’re transported again 50 years,” he mentioned. “You hearken to this music, and also you bear in mind what it means to be an Arab or a Palestinian,” he added.
Hemmou mentioned that immediately’s artists don’t match the emotion of the nice Arab singers of the twentieth century.
“The fashionable singers have no idea what they sing. The previous singers, they summon what’s deep inside us they usually revive our heritage,” he mentioned.
Music as resistance
Recognized all through the previous metropolis as Abu Shaadi, he has developed a repute past Nablus. Music lovers journey from afar to purchase from him.
“My prospects are from all around the West Financial institution, from Jerusalem, from Nazareth, Bethlehem, Jenin, Qalqiliya,” he mentioned. “They arrive from all of Palestine to purchase from me.”
Jamal Hemmou exhibits vinyl data in his store within the West Financial institution metropolis of Nablus, January 17, 2023. (JAAFAR ASHTIYEH / AFP)
Hemmou mentioned he has tried to carry his two sons, aged 26 and 27, into the enterprise.
“They aren’t ,” he informed AFP. “They inform me to show it off, they don’t need to pay attention.”
The road on which his store sits has seen fierce battles over the last yr, as Israeli forces performed raids concentrating on a brand new terror group known as “Lion’s Den,” primarily based in Nablus’s Previous Metropolis.
The store bears reminders of the battle — plastered on its shutters are the photographs of Palestinian gunmen killed in current months.
“When there are clashes we now have to shut the store, after all, however what can I say, I’m nonetheless alive, thank God,” he mentioned. “I play some nationwide songs, that’s my means of resisting.”
