Interview with Aya Metwalli, Egyptian Sound Composer: "Microphones and Mirrors"

In this episode, via Zoom, we are transported from Hollywood to Beirut, where I speak to Egyptian artist Aya Metwalli who is a vocalist, composer, improviser, and performer. Her favorite things are microphones and mirrors. Aya likes to crochet melodies with noise and is constantly listening out for music within the chaos around her.

The conversation is incredibly fascinating as we discuss a playlist featured at El NIDO by VC Projects art space, Hollywood. We talk about how her rich cultural history has informed her current art practice, steeped in experimental electronic sound, spirituality, and even a touch of what Aya says is a ‘demonic’ side. Listen in to hear Aya's inspiring story.

The tracks we discuss can be found from these online sources:

"Matkhafsh Menni" (Don’t be scared of me) https://ma3azef.bandcamp.com/track/matkhafsh-menni

"Splendor" (in progress work)

"Saturnus" (Spotify) https://open.spotify.com/track/5QB6G5kwF5JELFeptMaw6r?si=0887f00d69e34b9e

"100 Leyl" (nights) https://open.spotify.com/track/6pEzMzr1emIdNe5CyBzW8Z?si=7ede5c47bccc49f9

"Legure" (Spotify) https://open.spotify.com/track/2rwpYZqW1DBt4kGx233gFu?si=d8c7aba88f824aa9

Aya Metwalli (1988) is an Egyptian singer/songwriter, composer, and sound artist currently based in Beirut. She grew up in Cairo, where her father would play non-stop Oum Kalthoum songs on road trips to the beach, and her mother, known to have the most beautiful voice in the family, always sang at home and in gatherings with family and friends and long before she was able to form her own music taste, Aya was fed immense amounts of Arabic classic songs and melodies that now lie on a bed of velvet inside her subconscious mind.

Aya started fiddling with the upright piano they had at home around the age of four, and soon after, she got her first solo singing gig on the preschool stage and continued to practice the piano and perform Arabic song repertoires all throughout her school years. At the age of seventeen, she bought her first guitar and self-learned the instrument while she got her bachelor’s degree in English literature. She posted cover songs on YouTube, slowly gathering a growing online fan base, and soon after moved on to writing and composing her own original songs on the acoustic guitar until she studied music production in 2014 in Cairo and stretched out her sound. She self-released her debut EP, "Beitak," toward the end of 2016 and has been revamping her sound and developing her modus operandi.

Described as “a musical enigma” by The Guardian and a musician who has "crafted a spellbinding brand of anti-pop" by Pitchfork, Aya uses analog synthesizers to produce gritty textures and strange, unsettling soundscapes and she sings, heavily influenced by Arabic pop and classic melodies, modulating her voice with electronics to delve even deeper into a world of eeriness using heavy drones and drum machines to create a distorted, industrial body of sound crocheting noise with melody.

Over the past few years, she has performed solo live sets at Tectonics Festival in Greece, Norbergfestival in Sweden, La Magnifique Avant-Garde in France, Irtijal Festival in Lebanon, played with the Lebanese free-rock powerhouse trio Calamita at the CTM festival and Die Akademie der Künste Berlin, been featured in Nicolas Jaar’s "sound- and light installation: Retaining the Energy, but Losing the Image" at Het HEM in the Netherlands, and most recently composed for and performed with the contemporary vocal ensemble Neue Vocalsolisten in the framework of ECLAT Contemporary Music Festival Stuttgart in February 2021 and ULTIMA Oslo Contemporary Music Festival in September 2022.

Besides music, Aya also has a background in dance and has completed a three-year intensive contemporary dance training program at the Cairo Contemporary Dance Center from 2012 to 2015 in Egypt under the artistic direction of renowned Egyptian contemporary dancer and choreographer Karima Mansour. In 2019, she took part in the critically acclaimed Lebanese choreographer Ali Chahrour's theater creation "Layl/Night" as a dancer and singer. Between 2019 and 2022, the piece was performed on the stages of Ann Arbor University in Michigan, Bard College in New York, Zürcher Theater Spektakel in Zurich, Kunstfest in Weimar, Campania Teatro Festival in Napoli, and DañsFabrik in Brest.

At present, Aya is working on her debut LP album and is further exploring live performance, continuing to incorporate theatricality into her shows.