B I O G R A P H Y

Mohamed Badawi
(Oud, vocals, percussion)

Mohamed Badawi is a doctor of linguistics and founder, composer, and singer of the groups Diwan and El Nour (www.elnour.de). The oud, or Middle-East lute, plays a central role in his musical renditions. In addition to the oud, he also plays a Sudanese variation of the Bongos, which consists of three drums.

He began learning the traditional rhythms of his homeland as early as the age of five and these skills influence and enrich his music. Vocally, he covers the entire Arabic musical spectrum, from the historical religious Sufi music to the lively modern music heard world-wide. He stems from the well-known Sufi family of the Quadiriyya and has lived in Europe since 1984.

Since 1987, Mohamed Badawi has collaborated in numerous projects with musicians from all over the world. He has had the pleasure of working with Iyad Himour and the group Palmyre (Syria), Naziha Azzouz (Algeria), the expert tabla player Ibrahim El Minyawi (Egypt), Haja and Lego (Madagascar), and Afrique Loloé, to name a few, as well as Diara Konaté (Guinea), Haisam Salah Edine (Lebanon), Surendran Reddy (South Africa), Chiha (Tunesia), and the choreographer Peter Czerner (USA).

In 2000, he took oud classes from the Syrian professor Adnan Aylouch in Damascus. He composed music for dance and puppet theater performances in Germany and Switzerland. In 2000, the lord mayor of Constance honored Mohamed Badawi in the name of the Internationaler Tag des Freiwilligen Engagements (the International Day of Volunteer Commitment) for his dedicated efforts in school projects in Sudan.