Michel Akkaoui: Tears of Joy, Sadness, and Longing for Home

Record sleeve photo of Michel Akkaoui. Courtesy of Richard M. Breaux collection.

By 1957, in the Arab American music world the hafla and mahrajan circuit reached their apex. The period Anne Rasmussen labeled the nightclub era had just gotten its legs. The second wave of Arab immigration to the United States brought new souls, growing in demographic diversity, and fresh faces to the almost half-century old music scene. Sana & Amer Kadaj, Jalil Azzouz, Mohammed El-Akkad, Jack Ganaim, Mohamed el-Bakkar, and others made up the vast array of new musicians recording on Fred Alam’s Alamphon, Albert Rashid’s Al-Chark, George N. Gorayeb's Arabphon, Cleopatra, and growing set of vanity and re-issue labels for Arab and Arab American audiences and listeners to enjoy. Into this milieu stepped the relatively unknown-oudist Michel Akkaoui.

 

Michel Akkaoui was born in Tripoli, Lebanon 27 September 1930. We know very little about Akkaoui's life in Tripoli, but the city is second in population only to Beirut. French Mandate’s cultural influence had become increasingly evident in bigger cities, like Tripoli and the area entered the era of the Lebanese Republic. Approximately two months after Akkaoui’s thirteenth birthday, Lebanon gained its independence. Akkaoui learned to played the oud and honed his talents as a vocalist. At some point, he met Lebanese singing star - Wadih El Safi.

Before and on the eve of World War I, people who left Greater Syria in search of economic opportunity and others who fled Turkish military conscription journeyed to and from Beirut, the Beqaa, Mount Lebanon including Tripoli, and the diasporic countries in the Americas, including the United States. Mohamed Zaineldeen served in the Ottoman Army for three months before coming state side and others like soon-to-be Maloof Phonograph Record's singer Salim Doumani spent time imprisoned by the Ottoman's before immigrating to the United States. Following the war's end, after the revolt against French mandate forces, and leading up to the second World War, movements toward independence became hallmarks of the region. Relative peace and stability characterized much of Lebanon immediately after World War II, however the Arab-Israeli conflict, the influx of Palestinian refugees, and attempts by some countries to direct the political-economic destiny of Lebanon under the guise of fighting the spread of communism, added to the fragility and precariousness of life in Lebanon.  

Michel Akkaoui arrived in New York on the S.S. Andrea Doria five months before the ship collided with the MS Stockholm and sank. Courtesy of Ancestry.com and Wikipedia Public Commons.

In 1956, Michel Akkaoui left Lebanon sailed to Genoa, Italy, and then departed Italy onboard the later-infamous SS Andrea Doria (the Andrea Doria sank off the coast of Nantucket in July, 1956). The journey from Genoa to New York took eight days and Akkaoui disembarked at Ellis Island on 11 February 1956 with a final destination of Providence, Rhode Island. In the country on a P-class entertainers visa, reports are that Akkaoui was deported 4 July 1956. During his time in the US, Akkaoui met and married Camille Tanury. Akkaoui spent the next few months trying to back to the United States from Lebanon. Four months to the day U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower issued his “Special Message to Congress on the Situation in the Middle East” or the so-called Eisenhower Doctrine, providing financial or military assistance to Middle Eastern countries facing aggression, Michel Akkaoui arrived at Boston’s Logan International Airport onboard Pan American Airways flight #5/2. 

Michel Akkaoui returns to the US on Pan Am Airways in 1957. Courtesy of Ancestry.com

Within a few months, Michel Akkaoui settled, not in one of the Syrian or Lebanese communities surrounding Boston, but in Riverside, Rhode Island, - an East Providence neighborhood only twelve miles from Pawtucket, then recently home to one of the largest mahrajans or mahrjanat on the east coast. Approximately, 3000 Arabic-speaking people lived in Boston as early as 1907. During the same year, roughly 600 lived in Providence and 1,100 in all of Rhode Island. Six months after his May 1957 arrival, Akkaoui connected with Arab American musicians Philip Solomon and John Nazarian and performed with these two and others at Saint George Maronite Church’s Annual Parish Reunion hafla at the Elk’s Ballroom. Although he could play the oud, Akkaoui primarily sang, backed by an ensemble of Philip (violin), Tony (oud), and Dan Solomon (derbeke), Jake Roukous (mijwiz), Riad Khoury (oud), and Fred Tanury (derbeke), to a “capacity crowd.” Soon, playing Saint George’s annual hafla became a regular event for Akkaoui, Philip Solomon, and sometimes, John Nazarian. In 1958, the incomparable Kahraman (Olga Agby) accompanied Akkaoui on vocals.  The Knights of Saint George men’s group hafla also provided steady gigs for Akkaouri - a November 1960 hafla matched him up with Eddie Khorey and Lila Stephen. 

 

Ad to hire Michel Akkaoui from the Caravan 9 June 1960. Courtesy of newspapers.com

At some point in the late 1950s or early 1960s, Akkaoui cut two sides on a 7” 33 1/3 record. Distributed on a personal/vanity label and recorded at RLM Recording Studio at 79 Chesnut Street in North Attleboro, Massachusetts, Akkaouri’s disc includes two songs: 1) “Keef Budee Inseh” and “Ya Ahmi Ya Jamal.” He both composed and arranged the two songs. We know for certain RLM maintained facilities in 1963 and 1964. We don't know if Akkaoui recorded any other music.

Rare copy of Akkaoui Record. Courtesy of Richard M. Breaux collection.
Michel Akkaoui "Keef Budee Inseh," https://youtu.be/ZhGchpsYpGc
Michel Akkaoui, "Ya Ahmi Ya Jamal." https://youtu.be/aM0Y6u7sOh8

 

Beyond his interests in music, Akkaoui married, found work, and became a naturalized US citizen. Michel returned to Camille Tanury, whose family founded the Tanury Brothers metal plating and finishing company in 1946. Tanury Brothers began as a jewelry plating and finishing business but soon expanded into finishings for automobiles, airplanes, pens, and eye glasses. Michel eventually worked his way up to a production manager, and like most Arab immigrant and Arab American musicians, played music as a hobby and side business. On September 3, 1963, Michel officially became a naturalized United States citizen after six years in Rhode Island. The United States had only lifted certain racial restrictions on immigration just more than a decade before and would not see major immigration reform for two more years. Camille also gave birth to children Michael and Paula.

Naturalization card for Michel Akkaoui. Courtesy of Ancestry.com

The 1960s and 1970s brought about the opportunity to play beyond Providence and Rhode Island, yet most of Michel Akkaoui’s bookings remained regionally in New England. Akkaoui formed his own ensemble and played at the Saint George’s Syrian Orthodox Church “Gala Hafla” in Lowell, Massachusetts on May 25, 1963. He and his troupe returned to Saint George’s in Lowell for a Halloween-day Hafla the following year. Musicians from his earlier days, John Nazarian, Philip Solomon, and Mitchell Albert reunited for the Spring hafla at Our Lady of the Cedars of Lebanon in Boston’s South in the spring of 1964. Michel disappears from the public record and likely the New England hafla circuit, but re-emerged in 1973 as the headliner at the Saint Ann’s Church hafla on a hotel rooftop in New London, Connecticut. 

 

The last years we can document Akkaoui performing publicly are in his fifth decade. At age 50 and 52, he traveled to Pennsylvania to star at the annual Lebanese Heritage Days event August 15-16, 1981, sponsored by Our Lady of Lebanon Church near Allentown. Some 300 people celebrated the forty-first anniversary of Lebanese independence with the Lebanese American Charitable Association and the American Lebanese League in Allentown. Not only was Lebanon in the midst of a civil war, but Israel had also recently invaded southern Lebanon in response to what it claimed was a Palestinian Liberation Organization attack launched from the refugee camps at Sabra and Shatila. In response, Israel bombed these refugee camps killing over 200 people. Back in Allentown, Pennsylvania, some at the event focused on the negative impact of Palestinian refugees in the homeland while others empathized celebrating the anniversary of Lebanon’s independence and the enduring culture of Lebanese people in the United States. 

 

In Riverside and Providence, Michel became increasingly involved at Saint George’s Maronite Church. He directed the church’s choir, continued to sing himself, and attended and supported a number of causes and events associated with his church. He and Camille also became grandparents as they settled into life as seniors. Michel (Mitch) Akkaoui died 3 August 2020. Akkaoui's family recalled in his obituary "he could bring a crowd to tears with his soulful singing or hundreds to their feet to dance for hours." His musical career was one not as widely known or celebrated as many of those from the golden and nightclub eras of Arab American music, yet his two recordings give us a sense of his talent and the reasons a generation of Lebanese Americans fondly remember his voice. 

Special Thanks to Michael A. and Paula F.

 

Richard M. Breaux

 

© Midwest Mahjar