In two weeks time, legendary Lebanese singer Fairuz will celebrate her 88th birthday. So, we wanted to celebrate her! Read on to find out how one of the best-selling musical artists in the world came to be and how she was so famous she was briefly able to pause the civil war!
Born in 1934 in Beirut, Nouhad Haddad always had a passion for music. Her family were not particularly wealthy and didn’t even own a radio, but that didn’t stop the young girl from listening in to the neighbour’s radio and singing along to the songs she knew. She was the oldest of four children but her father worked hard as a typesetter in a print shop in order to send his children to school.
And it was at school that people began to take notice of her voice. She was part of the school choir and would sing in school plays. In her teenage years, she was spotted by a teacher from the Lebanese Conservatory, Mohammed Flayfel, who encouraged Haddad to enrol. Here she was able to perfect her voice and practise a range of both Western and Arabic styles. Again, the fates aligned, this time for Haddad to be spotted by the head of Radio Lebanon, one of the biggest radio stations in the region.
She was appointed a chorus singer on the radio, and this is where she adopted the stage name Fairuz (meaning Turquoise). It was here that she met musicians (and brothers) Assi and Mansour Rahbani. They began to work collaboratively, with the Rahbani brothers composing music for Fairuz to sing to. One of their first songs was ‘Itab’ (‘Blame’) and it became an instant hit when released in 1952.
Fairuz went on to hold many live performances, the first of which was the Baalbeck International Festival, held each July and August in the Beqaa Valley in Lebanon. Often her performances were full-on operatic musicals but she developed a range of styles, including songs that were often political in nature. She performed internationally everywhere from Athens to London to New York to Cairo, and she received countless awards, including the ‘Cavalier’ medal for artistic achievement from the Lebanese president Camille Chamoun.
She married her musical partner, Assi Rahbani, in 1955 and they were together until his death in 1986. Fairuz and Assi had remained in Lebanon throughout the Lebanese civil war and, although they didn’t perform in Lebanon during this time, they did write songs lamenting the violence. They didn’t take sides in the conflict and were well-loved by everyone, so much so that when Assi passed away, a ceasefire was declared to allow the widowed singer to bury her husband.
Today, Fairuz is one of the highest-selling Arab female artists of all time (alongside Egyptian singer Umm Kulthum) and in her long and successful career, she has recorded nearly 1500 songs, performed in 20 musicals and sold over 150 million records worldwide. Happy birthday Fairuz!
