MIRA AWAD
Half Palestinian half Bulgarian by heritage, Israeli by citizenship, British by residency, Mira Awad believes in global identities and a united human nation. However, throughout her life, she had to tread carefully between narratives and was violently pulled between definitions of identities, eventually reaching equilibrium. With a unique perspective on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, she is one of the sought out speakers and performers.
Born in Rama village in the Galilee (North of Israel), to Palestinian father-Anwar, and Bulgarian mother-Snejanka, currently living in London.
Mira studied music at the Rimon School for Jazz and Contemporary Music (Tel-Aviv) and throughout her career she developed a unique fusion of sounds, combining the East with the West, weaving the Arabic language and it’s oriental ornaments with Western harmonies, and bringing together her passions for folk, rock, Latin, traditional Middle Eastern and Balkan music into a rich tapestry of sounds, songs and observations.
Mira has collaborated with a wide range of world-famous musicians: Noa (Achinoam Nini), Idan Raichel, Greek singer George Dalaras, hip hop artist Guy Mar, David Broza, Joca Perpignan, international star Andrea Bocelli and the one and only Bobby Mc’Ferrin. She now regularly collaborates with Rolling Stones saxophonist Tim Ries.
Mira worked as an actress with the Tel-Aviv Cameri Theatre, she also was Eliza Doolittle in the renown musical “My Fair Lady”, and stared on the highly rated TV series “Arab Labor” that deals with the complex reality of Palestinians inside Israel. Movies: “The Bubble”, directed by Eytan Fox. “Zaytoun” by director Eran Riklis. “Farewell Baghdad” by director Nissim Dayan. She recorded the theme songs for the films “Forgiveness” by director Udi Aloni, and “Lemon tree” by Eran Riklis.
Mira participated in the 5th season of the Israeli version of “Dancing with the stars”. She competed in the Eurovision song contest 2009 alongside Noa with the song “There must be another way” from their duet album carrying the same name, released by Universal Music. Her debut solo album “Bahlawan-Acrobat” was released May 2009, and was produced by Israeli guitarist Amos Ever-Hadani. She was signed as a Sony Spain artist in 2011 and released her second album “All my faces” with Spanish musical producer Carlos Jean.
In 2013 she decided to go independent and created her own label named Label Free.
Her latest album was released in 2022 and was a double album called HuMAN/WoMAN, with one of the parts dedicated to issues of identity and the other to her agenda of human solidarity.
Mira is also an award winning composer for theatre and film, and she created and co-wrote the semi-biographical TV drama Muna. Mira is very much identified with the agenda of dialogue and is dedicated to raising a call for human solidarity.
Mira’s newest single release, Yaba (Father), from her upcoming double album HuMAN/WoMAN speaks about identity and belonging. Mira Awad writes, “My father and I were born and raised in the same exact geographical spot – A village called Rameh in the Galilee. However, he was born in 1936 in what was called Palestine, while in 1975 I was born in Israel. The song Yaba is about our identity as native Palestinian citizens of this troubled homeland.”
N.Y. / Region
A Rainbow of Fragility
By STEPHEN HOLDEN
-Published: June 5, 2013-
A line from the Sting song “Fragile” — “Nothing comes from violence/And nothing ever could” — became much more than a sad reflection on human nature when sung by the Arab-Israeli singer and songwriter Mira Awad at the Metropolitan Room on Tuesday evening. Ms. Awad, 37, who sings in Arabic and English and occasionally in Hebrew, was born in Rameh in Galilee to a Palestinian father and Bulgarian mother. She stars in “Arab Labor,” a popular Israeli television comedy about Jewish and Arab coexistence.
Her version of the austere Sting ballad, which when harmonized in a certain way assumes a Middle Eastern modality not unlike that of Ms. Awad’s original songs, was one of the strongest moments in a show, “Arabic Fusion,” in which she was joined by the guitarist Avi Fox-Rosen. Ms. Awad played several instruments, including guitar, frame drum and most strikingly, a nay, a Middle Eastern flute in which the whoosh of the player’s breath fuses with the tone of the instrument and makes it possible to make vocal sounds while playing.
Ms. Awad’s emphatic rendition of “Fragile” lent it the immediacy of a peace anthem. Among her original compositions, “Bahlawan” stood out. It describes a profound feeling of trying to maintain balance on an emotional and political tightrope.
Ms. Awad speaks English well, and delivered several songs in two languages. Especially when singing in Arabic, she became a passionate, multilayered interpreter negotiating the complex melismas and curlicues of her long-lined folk songs with a confident authority.
This music, with its entrancing sensuality accentuated by the singer’s guttural crooning, was intensely seductive, and I felt drawn into its mysterious spell. Although her songs can be happy, the predominant mood suggested ancient sorrow built into the music.
Whether expressing a desire for peace and reconciliation or personal longing, Ms. Awad evoked a world of division, of lovers torn apart, of people waiting for the dawn with a complicated mixture of despair and hope. When Ms. Awad explained the songs in English or translated passages, the sentiments tended to sound banal. But when she sang in Arabic, primal feelings that may be impossible to translate into any language came to the fore.
The Jewish Week // read
The Guardian, UK // read