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She is the only daughter, born
in a small income Egyptian family. AWATEF MOHAMMED EL AGAMY,
later to be known as NAGWA FOUAD moved to Cairo after realising
her potential, love and ability in Egyptian dancing through her
appearances in her family and local weddings and social gatherings
which made her think seriously of taking it up professionally.
So, she came to Cairo and started working in some of the small
nightclubs, she drew strong attention to herself through her perfect
musical interpretation, lean body, excellent performance, unique
rhythmic qualities and a romantic feel for the dance that was
a magnet to all her audiences.
Nagwa trained on the hands of various retired dancers and contemporary
trainers and choreographers as well as her sixth sense for choosing
the top class musicians in her band. She trained not only in Egyptian
dance and music but also concentrated on learning classical and
contemporary Western dance and music, such as Ballet, Jazz and
Tap dancing, which gave her a huge reference bank to draw on as
her carer developed during the 50's, 60's, 70's, 80's, 90's and
now the 2000's of which we are all proud.
This amazing dancer is, at the time of writing this article, is
the only remaining dancing film star who came from the 50's and
has earned the title and crown which entitles her to be added
to the "STARS OF EGYPTÔ" video series as one of the historic ladies
who made Egyptian dance what it is today.
Nagwa Fouad's ability to stay supple and healthy is due to her
love of dancing and sports. Her favourite sports are tennis, aerobics
and swimming, and walking which she has been careful to maintain
her shape and beauty during her life.
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Her first introduction to the
world of cinema was in the film "Sharei El Hob" (The Street Of
Love) starring with a magnificent host of star actors and actresses
and singers such as Hessein Reyad, the grandfather of Egyptian
actors, Abdel Salam El Naboulsy, Zeinat Sedqy and of course starring
Abdel Halim Hafiz in the classic song of "Olulu" (Tell Her){this
song is available on Hossam Ramzy's "Best Of Abdel Halim Hafiz
EUCD 1195}. The story of this block buster movie is about a young
artist born to a poor family from Mohammed Ali Street, where all
the Cairo musicians live, who's father was a poor musician in
the Hasaballa Band, and here is a piece of Egyptian music history
for you.
The Hasaballa style of music came
from a musician by the name of Hasaballa, an ex military band
musician who formed a band of his old army retired musician friends,
playing Egyptian traditional wedding, folkloric and pop songs
on brass instruments in a marching style band. They were louder,
cheaper and very capturing to the attention in their X army uniforms
especially when they are hired to perform in an event that demands
a lot of noise such as a new bride's dowry, furniture and clothes
are being transferred from her family house and going to her husbands
to be house. Also they were used in other occasions such as someone's
release from prison, weddings and when someone is going to Mecca
for pilgrimage.
To go back to the story of the film, they send this young talented
boy, played by Abdel Halim Hafiz, to the Institute Of Arabian
Music to study music and singing and to come back as an educated
artist of whom they can all be proud. You see, most of the people
looked down on the Hasaballa and the Mohammed Ali Street musicians
and they considered them the riffraff of the music world, so it
would have been a great opportunity to gain social respect if
one of them was an educated person who can teach them the proper
ways and to be proud of him.
Any way, when the young boy, Abdel Halim Hafiz, returns from his
university after he passes the exam, he is met with a big street
party where as you will be able to hear in the song "Olulu", there
is almost a duel between the "regular" Egyptian band and the Hasaballa
band. Nagwa danced her first film appearance in that song which
in my personal opinion is as close as one can get to the most
natural demonstration of a true Egyptian common (in the best definition
of the word common) young woman would dance. Perfectly innocent,
full of love, emotionally well expressed, translating all the
bits of music wonderfully and portraying the story line in a master
class performance that has to be seen to be believed.
The film Sharei EL Hob became a classic and created fame for all
of Nagwa, Abdel Halim Hafiz as well as SABAH the notorious Lebanese
singer. After that, Nagwa always performed in the concerts of
Abdel Halim as an opening star dancer for his shows, which made
her more and more famous as Abdel Halim was labelled (The Egyptian
Dark Grape) for his beautiful and sweet dark voice and was the
heartbreaker of almost ALL of the Arabian, not just Egyptian women.
Nagwa Fouad became very conscious of the fact that her band had
to be at least compatible in standard, if not as good as Abdel
Halim's who used to work with the AL MASSEYA ORCHESTRA (The Diamond
Orchestra) led by the late Ahmed Fouad Hassan, the Qanun player,
some of the famous musicians in the band were the also departed
Mahmoud Effat on Nay (featured also on Hossam Ramzy's CDs the
best of Om Kolthoum, Abdel Halim, Farid Al Atrash and Mohammed
Abdel Wahab and to whom the album Source Of Fire also by Hossam
is dedicated), Mahmoud Hammouda on Tabla (Hossam's master teacher),
and a host of the biggest and most respected violin and string
section in the whole of the middle East.
In her band, Nagwa Fouad had Ahmed Hammouda, Mahmoud Hammouda's
brother on Tabla, the master of all dance style drummers and he
first man to ever play a "Live or Recorded Tabla Solo" in the
history of dance music and performance. He incorporated many Egyptian
folkloric elements such as the Haggala and the Oasis style Bedouin
rhythms into that Tabla Solo that are still heard today on many
dance CDs and which many drummers still copy as their standard
Tabla Solo. Ahmed Hammouda also incorporated various style of
rolls on the "Taks" that would be played either on the "Maqsoum
Rhythm" on the counts of 1 & 2 then followed by stops of a "Dom"
on the count of 3 and a "Slap" on the count of 4 that have become
the "Tabla Solo Classics" of all time. Nagwa also had Mohammed
Ayyad on Duff and Mazhar, plus a large section of percussionists.
On Violin solo she sometimes had
Mahmoud El Gersha (One of Egypt's most sensual violin soloists
who could mix Egyptian sound with western classical then back
to the dirtiest Baladi and come back in a dancing theme over only
4 bars of music). She also had Samy El Bably on Trumpet (Also
featured many times on Hossam Ramzy's CDs) the only man who can
play a western trumpet like an Egyptian sounding instrument. On
accordion she had Hassan Abu El Saud (from the "Saher EL Accordion"
famous CD and also one of Ahmed Adaweya's most preferred accordionists,
also some times she had Mohammed Hamidu on accordion (who composed
many of her dance compositions) and sometimes she used Mohammed
Asfour (also from the Ahmed Adaweya band. But her most miraculous
performer was her Nay player Sayed Abu Sheffa. The word Abu Sheffa
means the man with the Hare Lip (Clef Pallet) which makes it impossible
for the person to play any wind instruments AT ALL, however Abu
Sheffa played the Nay and Kawala Egyptian Bamboo flutes like no
one else could. Extremely burning sound and an incredible ability
to haunt you with one straight musical note.
Because the true Egyptian dancer is considered, by those who know
anything about Egyptian dancing, as another instrumentalist member
of the orchestra. The dancer is the one that makes the music come
alive, gives the sound a physical, three-dimensional existence.
Interacting with her musicians, inspiring them as she is inspired
by their virtuoso performances and taking all of that by the scruff
of the neck and portraying to the audience in her aesthetic seduction.
Having such a frightfully powerful band and believe me they didn't
come any stronger than the above mentioned group of musicians,
Nagwa became more and more musical, rhythmic and more and more
talented in her dancing and musical performances, able to explore
the impossible and boldly go where no previous dancers could have
gone before her.
Many of Nagwa's choreographies and performances had that element
of surprise as well as experimentation to the maximum limits of
fusion, while adhering to the purest forms of art fields that
are being fused. She really understood her Baladi and her Egyptian
classical as well as ALL of the Egyptian, Arabian and North African
Styles of folklore and regular dance. She also studied Western
Classical Ballet, Jazz and Tap, and in some of her tableaux performances,
I do recall her doing some Flamenco and even Argentinean Tango.
People's love and admiration for Nagwa Fouad's dance and stunning
personality was not coming only from her loving audience world
wide, but also from composers such as the legendary Mohammed Abdel
Wahab who composed the dance music "Amar Arbaatasher" (The moon
of the 14th day of the Lunar Month) Signifying the most beautiful
face) especially for her, and of course the choreography, set,
costumes and performance of that music was matching to the quality
of its composition.
I do recall a time in Cairo in 1998 where I went to spend an evening
in the Marriot Hotel in Cairo where Nagwa was dancing and thought
to myself… I was a bit estranged by the show, as it had quite
a few elements in it that I was not too sure of their suitability
to the show and wanted to see where was Nagwa coming from on this
fusion. So I asked her when she came to my table to dance "Ashara
Baladi" (meaning "Ten Baladi") (as it is known to us in Egypt.
It is a dance sequence of the pure Egyptian Urbanised Folklore
dancing that you can read about on this site by the name of "Baladi"
also another article called "Zeinab").
To cut a long story short, Hamidu played the accordion introduction
and she danced so sensual, so perfectly in tune and in harmonic
motion with him until the rhythm started and she took my heart
straight up to my throat and brought tears to my eyes, not to
mention the Tabla Solo that she did after with Ali Ahmed Ali (
the Tabla Player at the time who used to be the personal player
and teacher and trainer of Mona El Said) that shook the whole
place, plus the rapture of the audience's applause almost took
the place down.
Many of the famous dance pieces that were being danced in almost
all of the Arabian / Egyptian Night clubs such as Naasa, Mashaael,
Ali Loze, Shick - Shak - Shok, El Saidi and Amar Arbaatasher where
actual compositions for Nagwa Fouad. This is just to mention but
a few.
I thank God for the fact that until the day of writing this article,
the 21st of November 2001, on a VARIG Air line flight number 8614
from Buenos Aires, Argentina on my way to Santiago, Chile on a
dance workshop tour between the two countries, our beloved Nagwa
Fouad was still alive and very involved in the world of art, dance
and music and I pray that he may keep her for us in good health
and high spirits. |
