The distance between Somaliland and Sheffield is getting shorter. Six years ago, Magid Magid – born in that African country before arriving with his family in the Steel City as a refugee – became the youngest ever Lord Mayor of Sheffield. And tonight, here in York, Sahra Halgan and Bobby Lee will be taking to the Crescent stage. The former is a Somali singer and cultural activist, the latter a cosmic country-blues musician from Sheffield.
Bobby Lee is no stranger to the Crescent. He was here with his band last October and then returned a few weeks later as part of A Yorkshire Tribute to Michael Chapman. Back again with his trio and now sporting a quite marvellous cowboy hat – one that Hoss Cartwright in the American western TV series Bonanza would have been proud to wear – Lee eases into the rather aptly named ‘Palomino’ from his 2020 album, Shakedown in Slabtown. This instrumental music may appear to drift inwards in Lee’s unhurried hands but as the song blurs into ‘Broken Prayer Stick’ its crystalline texture slowly begins to emerge.
As the set gathers its own sweet momentum and the details in Bobby Lee’s playing grow and resonate, the three men arrive at ‘Heat Index’ one of the two Michael Chapman songs they had played when last at this venue. It comes here tonight imbued with all the honesty, grace, exploration, and wonder that inhabited many of Chapman’s songs. It all makes for another perfect demonstration of Lee’s fluidity and feel for the electric guitar.
Shortly after 9.00pm Sahra Halgan appears on stage with Maël Salètes (guitar), Aymeric Krol (drums and percussion), and Régis Monte (electronic keyboards), the four musicians having all played together on Hiddo Dhawr, Halgan’s excellent third album which was released earlier this year. For the next 80 minutes they enthral the Crescent crowd with their intoxicating, polyrhythmic, multifaceted sound, generating levels of infectious moving and grooving in the Crescent crowd that are far greater than those witnessed the previous day from Donald Trump when he fired up his campaign playlist at his latest Republican rally in Oaks, Pennsylvania.
The sound that Sahra Halgan and her band create firmly embraces qaraami – the oldest modern musical composition of Somaliland – whilst also drawing upon the disparate elements of rock’n’roll, funk, afro-psych, and an empathic ear for a damn good tune.
Showcasing material from Hiddo Dhawr (the album’s title means Promote Culture and is also the name of the cultural centre that Sahra Halgan founded in 2013 in Hargeisa, the capital and largest city of the Republic of Somaliland), the songs are powered by the fractured urgency of Maël Salètes’ guitar riffs, the strident rhythms of Aymeric Krol’s drumming – at one point he also demonstrates his flair for the oud – and the surging runs of Régis Monte’s keyboard which at times echo Ray Manzarek’s delivery on The Doors’ albums. And over this glorious platform floats Sahra Halgan’s magnificent voice, possessing a strange hypnotic quality magnified by its frequent vibrato.
There is so much happiness and joy to behold in the music that Sahra Halgan and her fellow musicians produce though lest we should forget she gently reminds us of her time spent working as a self-taught nurse on the frontline during the fight to overthrow the dictator Siad Barre’s regime in her home country. Without the aid of any pain relief medication, she also sang to comfort those wounded in the bloody struggle. This is music that crosses so many frontiers, be they geographical, political, or cultural it demands our attention.
Photos: Simon Godley
More photos of Bobby Lee at The Crescent, York
More photos of Sahra Halgan at The Crescent, York
This show was a Ouroboros promotion.
