In the 1990s I had the good fortune to meet with the late Algerian singing star Idir (Hamid Cheriet 1949-2020). We chatted for several hours in a café outside the Berber Cultural Association in Paris.

Remember Aamir Khan and Rani Mukerji’s Mann (1999)? One of its songs, Kaali Nagin Ke Jaisi, has an unexpected musical connection to Algeria. But the more interesting story is the man behind that ...

Photo courtesy of Habibi Funk’s Soundcloud Algerian composer Ahmed Malek, who scored Algerian films and television shows, has the reputation of being the Arab world’s answer to Ennio Morricone. The ...

The death of Algerian icon Idir has brought an important chapter of Algerian music to a close. Through his brilliant career, Idir modernised and promoted the richness of Kabyle melodies and poetry, ...

The audience are on their feet and dancing, during a jazz concert by Minneapolis U.S. Bluesman Bernard Allison in Constantine, Algeria. Young people climbed up the old marble columns of the hall for a ...

I’ve been loving every note of a wonderful new jazz/Algerian chaâbi fusion album called Koum Tara: Chaâbi, Jazz and Strings. I featured a track from it on last week’s show,… The music of Koum Tara: ...

Idir, an Algerian singer who gave voice to the Berber and Kabyle cultures, has died. By Associated Press Idir, an Algerian singer who gave voice to the Berber and Kabyle cultures, has died in Paris.

Imarhan emerged from southern Algeria’s close-knit Tuareg community in 2006. Fans of Tuareg rock greats Tinariwen will already be familiar with the quintet; Imarhan front man Iyad Moussa Ben ...

Rachid Taha, the French-Algerian singer best known for fusing rock with raï, a form of traditional Algerian folk, has died from a heart attack at age 59. “It is with regret and immense sadness that ...

Born in Algeria but living in France since he was 10, Taha was always passionately outspoken in his songs both against what he saw as the West's racism and unjust wars, and the Arab world's ...

Algerian singer Idir, who gave voice to his native Kabylie and its Berber language, has died in Paris aged 70. Idir, whose real name was Hamid Cheriet, died from lung disease after being hospitalised ...