The temperature was neither warm nor cold on a slow-paced, bright spring day which promised normalcy in Riyadh, an affluent district in Sudan’s capital, Khartoum.
Mahdi Ali, also known as MaMan, a celebrated Sudanese music producer and singer, slept in late, unaware that the world outside was rapidly changing.
When he finally woke up around noon, an eerie stillness filled the air.
The artist looked out the window, finding an unsettling silence. Riyadh, usually alive with modern cafés, corporate offices, and tree-lined streets, was nearly deserted.
Switching on the news, he tried to make sense of the chaos unfolding on the screen. It was 15 April, 2023, and fighting had erupted between the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) in Khartoum and other parts of the country.
For MaMan, the weight of the news took time to settle. “It really felt like a movie for a second,” he says. “I had to remind myself that it’s real so I could deal with the situation.”
The day was still bright, the sky painfully clear, and the only sign of what was coming were the planes cutting across it. Then, around four or five in the afternoon, the first gunshots in the area shattered this calm tension.
MaMan stayed at home the day after, with his whole family. “We thought it was going to cool down after like three days, maybe. But a lot of people just left like the second day… They knew it.”
After the second day, the electricity cut. The family waited for three days in the same house, along with their neighbours, who came and stayed with them. “My dad didn’t want us to leave immediately. And I understand. He built his whole life there,” says the artist.
As the gunfire and explosions grew closer, MaMan persuaded his father to move the family to Haj Yousif — the first stop in what would become a long and uncertain journey to Dongola.
A month into the war, Egypt was still allowing women, children under 16, and men over 50 to enter without a visa. To ensure their safety, MaMan and his family decided to send the women and children, including his four-year-old daughter, ahead — who reached Halfa State in a day and quickly boarded a bus to Egypt.
Meanwhile, MaMan, his brother Jaily, their neighbour, and his cousins were forced to wait in Halfa State for over a month, stuck in limbo as they awaited clearance from the Egyptian consulate.
“They gave me my papers for my birthday. Like, the day of leaving, the passport guy was just looking at me and laughing: ‘Just go in’.”
“The journey from Sudan to Egypt is very traumatic. Especially after October 2023, it started getting a little harder. There were suddenly visas and the process started taking a very long time, and sometimes your passport gets lost in the offices where they do all the paperwork, so it was very hard,” says Hadeel Osman, multidisciplinary artist and cultural manager at Cairo’s Goethe Institut Sudan.
Hadeel had come to Cairo for a holiday a month before the war and got stuck after the fighting broke out, eventually relocating to the Egyptian capital with her family.
“But then, in 2024, that’s when you actually saw the Sudanese music and artist scene starting to flourish here,” she says.
Creating opportunities
According to the cultural manager, the growing appreciation of Sudanese art in the Gulf countries sparked a reaction in Egypt, where the Sudanese music and artist scene began to thrive.
As the region’s media hub, with numerous production companies and a wide range of opportunities, Egypt — which now hosts over 1.2 million Sudanese — has made it easier for these artists to hone their craft, even if they have access to limited resources.
Compared to Sudan, where costs were already high even before the war, expenses have now skyrocketed, making Egypt a significantly cheaper option.
“Resources here are available: you can rent any camera you want, you can rent any studio, and it’s extremely cheap compared to Sudan,” says Hadeel. “Some people opened offices or studio spaces or recording studios even, or like multi-purpose spaces; and they’re able to open it legally and make money from that.”
One of them is Alam Abdoalgadeer, a 24-year-old who arrived in Cairo from South Darfur less than two years ago and founded Thorium Studio, a grassroots space for music and video production, which also houses the independent record label Al Academy.
“Most of the youth I met here are young people looking for an opportunity,” he says.
“So I came to provide opportunities. I’m working for them: it becomes like a forum, like a community. Even the name, we want to change it to Thorium Community,” he adds, stating that the end goal of his project is to turn it into an academy for teaching Sudanese art and music.
“Despite the war — even though it exhausted us, and many people suffered from it — it still pushed us to develop. It made us go outside and evolve, to see how people work, to see how Egyptians, for example, operate in the industry. I believe we have grown significantly after the war,” Alam continues.
When identity becomes a brand
MaMan’s latest album, Garmboza, released last week, was recorded entirely at Thorium Studio.
“This EP was self-financed and full of collaborations with different entities and facilitators,” says the artist. “One of them was Thorium Studio; apart from the recording, the energy of the guys and the crew together is something you can’t put a price on.”
That same energy was palpable at the album’s release party, which brought together both veteran members of Sudan’s music community — like MaMan — and emerging artists carving out their space in Cairo.
Before MaMan’s performance, newcomers had the opportunity to take the stage in front of an influential crowd. Throughout the event, there was not a single mention of the war — only references to Sudanese Arabic slang and the Sufi influences that shaped the album’s sound.
In line with MaMan’s philosophy, Hadeel expresses concerns about how struggle and identity are often being packaged and prioritised over artistic expression.
“I would prefer if an artist was just an artist. For the longest time, I was just Hadeel and I happen to be from Sudan. I was showcasing the best that I could in my field. And when you find out I’m Sudanese, then that can create more conversation,” she says.
Menna Shanab, former manager of MaMan and current music editor at YUNG Magazine, points to what she calls ‘identity performance’ used for corporate branding purposes as a concerning trend that needs to be addressed.
“[It feels as if] you’ve got to perform your ‘Sudaneseness’. You’ve got to perform that you are a victim of war. That’s the route that’s rewarded. Performing this victim identity and this narrative of ‘we left the war and now we’re trying to make it’. In this way, that’s what the [Western] labels want: to tell this kind of story,” Menna weighs in.
“I personally don’t like art that is based on conflict because at some point it’s repetitive and how long are we going to play the victim role? Yes, we’re all displaced and a lot of us have refugee status, but that’s not who I am. This is our situation, but that’s not everything. There’s a lot of life in me, so then I can push the art to come from inside,” Hadeel adds.
Menna also warns that artists may unconsciously “milk” their cultural identities to gain Western recognition rather than pursuing their own creative paths.
“Then they [the industry] call it representation, identity. And so when you do that, the music is always left on the back burner, always the last thing to be thought about. There’s always the packaging of identity first before anything else [to appeal to the Western industry]. And so it’s scary,” she explains.
Rap Shar3
In a globalised world, social media has played a crucial role in showcasing the work of Sudanese artists.
One of the most influential platforms in this regard is Rap Shar3, a grassroots, Arabic-language Instagram and TikTok page that has become a vital space for underground rap in the Middle East and North Africa.
Founded by Egyptian artist BlackB, Rap Shar3 organises live rap battles and performances, often filmed in urban settings and widely shared across social media.
For Menna, this is the only platform of these characteristics that has not focused on “how someone looks or the appearance. It’s actually about the music.”
“There were Sudanese rappers in Rap Shar3 that I had never heard of, and I made a point to look them up and check out their music. I think what’s great about it is that it exposes the variety of Sudanese artists,” says Hadeel.
“When I first met Mahdi (MaMan), he knew nothing in Egypt. He didn’t even know where to record. He didn’t know famous Egyptian rappers to collaborate with. He didn’t know how to do things here. But I think Rap Shar3 put him on the map in a way that, one, it made him see who else is out there, and two, allowed people to be able to know that he’s here,” Menna adds.
“I’ve noticed that Sudanese artists here don’t compete with Egyptian artists — they still compete with each other,” says Hadeel. “The Sudanese compete with each other in Cairo, and regionally as well, because they all came from the same place.”
Hadeel points out that these artists are carving out their own lane within the Egyptian industry; however, despite the Egyptian and Sudanese music scenes in Cairo not competing for audiences, they do compete for resources.
“I see the Sudanese scene moving, but where do they pour back into? They pour back into the infrastructures of the countries that they are residing in,” says Menna. “They’re both developing scenes, and even if they’re not competing directly, the resources are what they need to go up. Egyptians can see it this way.”
“I feel like it’s all about being smart and knowing how to create these relationships and connections. Egyptians are very open. Yes, they gatekeep, but they’re also very curious in general,” says Hadeel.
“Now Sudanese music exists everywhere, and there’s a new Sudanese genre rooted in Sudan. In places like Cairo and worldwide, Sudanese music, both old and new, is something I want to promote. It’s something that — God willing, one day, Thorium will bring forward. I want to develop it and keep it on the same path, but in a way that supports young people as much as possible,” says Alam.
Sense of belonging
Less than a week after MaMan’s album release party, Alam organised an event called Sawt Al-Dunas (Voice of the Dunes) at the Afaq Theatre in Cairo’s Ramses district, bringing together emerging artists and introducing them to a new audience.
“I saw that Sudanese youth don’t have opportunities to showcase themselves, especially underground artists,” he says.
With ten artists performing for a predominantly young Sudanese crowd at an affordable price of 135 EGP (£2.13) online and 150 EGP (£2.36) upon arrival, the event democratised access to music, breaking class barriers, providing artists with a platform, and fostering a sense of community.
“The diaspora has something to be proud of for once. Now, when you have someone who’s going viral, and you’re like ‘oh, they’re from my country’, you feel this sense of belonging, and you come to terms with your identity,” concludes Hadeel.
“It’s this sense of pride that was taken away from us. It does heal a lot.”
Alejandro Matrán is a journalist, actor, and musician. He is also the founder of @thenewmidd
Follow him on X: @AlejandroMatran
Javier Jennings Mozo is an audio-visual freelance journalist based in Cairo who specialises in social issues. He has previously covered the Balkans and Spain
Follow him on X: @javierjenningsm
