Oum

Oum El Ghaït Benessahraoui (, born 18 April 1978), better known mononymously as Oum , is a Moroccan singer-songwriter. Performing and recording both in North Africa and in Europe, she mixes hassani, jazz, gospel, soul, afrobeat and Sufi musical influences in her songs.

Early life and education Oum, born in Casablanca and raised in Marrakesh, is a singer-songwriter inspired by Moroccan popular music, Hassani poetry (Moroccan desert culture) and African rhythms. She interprets her lyrics in Moroccan Arabic (Darija), Amazigh, French, English and Spanish.

At the young age of fourteen, Oum joined a gospel choir in her native Casablanca, where she impressed listeners with her voice and interpretation. At seventeen, her first song, "This is your heart" that she wrote to support the charity "Les malades du cœur", helped to successfully secure her first appearance on television. In 1996, she entered the National School of Architecture in Rabat and pursued her studies there until graduation in 2002.

Musical career At the same time, she began to perform in public. With a powerful and expressive voice, she interpreted songs by singers such as Aretha Franklin, Ella Fitzgerald or Whitney Houston. In 1998, Oum had her first experience with hip-hop and RnB, working with Djo Catangana, a producer and creator of the French hip hop collective Mafia Trece. The first single from her second album Sweerty (Luck), Whowa means "Him" in Moroccan Darija. It was released with a video clip in January 2010. In July 2012, she released Harguin, a collaboration with Blitz the Ambassador on the theme of illegal immigration from sub-Saharan Africa.

Oum was invited to the UNESCO headquarters in Paris on the occasion of International Women's Day to give a concert on 7 March 2012. In June 2013 she was invited to take part in the Gnaoua World Music Festival in Essaouira (Morocco).

Her song Taragalte, from the 2013 album Soul of Morocco, was used in the 2018 movie Beirut. In September 2015, she released her fourth album: Zarabi, which means "Carpets" in Moroccan Darija and is a tribute to the carpet weavers of the village of M'Hamid El Ghizlane in the Sahara region of the Moroccan South. She wrote and co-directed the album with Mathis Haug. Yacir Rami accompanied her on the oud, Cuba n musicians Damian Nueva on double bass and Yelfris Valdés on trumpet, as well as Moroccan percussionist Rhani Krija, who has played with Sting, Peter Gabriel and others, joined her band for this album.

Discography

Albums Lik'Oum (2009)

Sweerty (2012)

Soul of Morocco (2013)

Zarabi (2015)

Daba (2020)

Singles Oum featuring Barry : Dear Mamma (2003) Hamdoullah (2004) Daym Allah (2004) Africa (2004}) Humilité (2005) La Ti'ass feat. H. Kayne (2008) Hip Hop Exchange Featuring H-Kayne & Tote King (2009) Lik (2009) Oum featuring Don Bigg : Lik (2010) Taragalte (Soul of Morocco) (2013)