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Anis Fuleihan: A Lebanese-Cypriot American Composer, Pianist, and Scholar Rooted in Eastern and Western Musical Traditions

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  Anis Fuleihan: A Lebanese-Cypriot  American Composer, Pianist, and Scholar Rooted in Eastern and Western Musical Traditions Anis Fukeihan, photo from original 1919 document. Courtesy of Richard M. Breaux collection. Perhaps the best-known musician, pianist, composer, record manufacturer, in early twentieth-century Arab America was Alexander Maloof . Born in 1884, a composer of sheet music by 1900, and contributor to the idea of submitting a potential U.S. national anthem.  We’ve featured both Maloof and the composer Leon S. Nahmee on Midwest Mahjar. While going through stories the name of composer, musician, and pianist - Anis Fuleihan.     Born to Lebanese parents, Yasmine Nassif and Milheim Fuleihan, on 2 April 1900 near Kyrenia, Cyprus, Anis T. Fuleihan began playing piano at the age of four. Fuleihan claimed there had been no other musicians in his family except a “amateur lute player of some distinction” on his mother’s line of the family tree. An unknown local police bandleade

How Boston's Little Syria and its Music Scene Gave Birth to Tony Tawa & his Near East Caravan

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  How Boston's Little Syria and it's Music Scene Gave Birth to  Tony Tawa & his Near East Caravan  Tony Tawa, circa 1964. Boston Globe 7 July 1964. Newspapers.com Research interest in Boston’s Little Syria and Arab Boston metro area has skyrocketed in the last four years. Some of this interest springs from academic and public history seeking to document the long history of Arab immigrant and Arab American community building, cultural expression, employment and entrepreneurial opportunities, night clubs, and labor histories. At Midwest Mahjar we have profiled or featured several Arabic-speaking musicians from Boston and a few half-dozen more who resided in Massachusetts at various points in their careers. There was, of course, Russell Bunai , Tony Abdelahad , Lila Stephan , and Ronnie Kirby , who were in the state for most of their lives. Others like Rev. Theodore Ziton and Rev. Ilyas Kurban spent a portion of their priestly careers with brief stints in and around Boston.