Essouira Gnawa (Essouira Gnaoua)

Month : June
Place : Essaouira, Morocco
Famous For : Cultural Festival
Attractions : Gnawa Music, 3-Stringed Flute, Castanets and Ganga drums

The Esouira Gnawa festival is a popular Moroccan festival celebrated in the month of June every year. The festival is one of the youngest celebrations in the world with its advent dating to recent past in the year 1998. The most notifying feature of Esouira Gnawa festival is the spirit of mysticism, music, tradition and a message of tolerance to create a unique cultural celebration, which the festival infuses amongst masses every year.

Major Attractions

The festival of Esouira Gnawa was started to honor the music of the 'Gnawa' - descendents of African slaves who have formed brotherhoods across Morocco. The Gnawa music is a mixture of sub-Saharan African, Berber, and Arabic religious songs and rhythms. Combining acrobatic dancing and music, the Gnawa music is both a prayer and a celebration of life. The Gnawa musicians play the unique cadence of the Gnawa music along with practicing rituals similar to voodoo. There are three main instruments from which the music of the Gnawa ritual is created. These three instruments are a 3-stringed lute, castanets and Ganga drums. The celebrations of Gnawas festival involves a complex liturgy, called 'lila' or 'derdeba'. The ceremony recreates the first sacrifice and the genesis of the universe by the evocation of the seven main manifestations of the divine demiurgic activity. The 'derdeba' is jointly animated by a maalem (master musician) at the head of his troop and by moqadma or shuwafa (clairvoyante) who is in charge of the accessories and clothing necessary to the ritual.