In 2021, many years following his death, the name “Omar Khorshid” is currently trending on social media. But apart from the reasons why, we figured it might be a good time we take a moment to remember the milestones of his musical career.
Born in 1954, the aspiring young man with an electric guitar roamed Cairo’s parties, clubs and musical gatherings in hopes of finding his big break.
He was granted the latter when Abdel Halim Hafez offered him a job to join his oriental orchestra (El Ferqa El Masseya led by Ahmed Fouad Hassan) as a guitarist. And he surely made quite a buzz.
Later on, the handsome young man and musical find was invited to play in Um Kulthoum’s concerts as well and was also offered cinematic roles (on account of his good looks and pure talent).
“I was terrified and had to be on tranquilizers just to get myself up there on that stage.”
Here’s a rare interview of Omar Khorshid describing what it felt like playing next to Um Kulthoum for the first time.
And at a more advanced stage of his career, he decided to compose his own records. A mixture of western and eastern fusions using modern instruments like the keyboards, electric guitar and synthesizer.
The original records and movie scores, that were later on considered as revolutionary in the history of Egyptian music, received both local and international acclaim.
To the point where some international artists actually made covers over his original records! Here’s an example of a tribute album by Sir Richard Bishop named “The Freak Of Araby”.
