Funeral for a Nightingale

Few Westerners ever fathomed the appeal of Umm Kulthum, the buxom, handkerchief-waving Egyptian singer who was known to her Middle Eastern fans as "the Nightingale of the Nile." She had a stentorian contralto and a quavering wail that grated on the ears of those attuned to the trills of opera divas. But her voice was a near-perfect instrument for expressing the sinuous quarter tones of Arabic music.

Last week, at 76, Umm Kulthum died of a cerebral hemorrhage. She retired two years ago, and even before that her appearances were few. However, her public funeral rivaled that of Gamal Abdel Nasser's four years ago. Arab heads of state sent condolences, airlines laid on extra flights and railroads added trains to accommodate mourners. A frenzied crowd of a million people followed her funeral procession through Cairo streets, weeping and chanting "Goodbye to the lady." After rites at Sharkass Mosque, the crowd carried the coffin to the suburb of Basatin, where she was buried.

Umm Kulthum was born into a peasant family at Timay el Zahaira in the Nile Delta, where she developed her unique style by chanting Koranic verses for her father. When he took her to Cairo to sing, she was an instant success. Not only was her voice strong, but she perfected a technique of rephrasing passages--she once sang a single line 52 different ways--that drove audiences to rapture. Her repertoire ranged from love songs to political ballads to adaptations of Moslem poetry, including Omar Khayyam's Rubdiydt.

In 1937 she began a series of radio broadcasts on the first Thursday evening of each month that spread her fame across the Arab world. Concerts and records made a fortune for Umm Kulthum, who in private life was the wife of a Cairo physician. She also gave generously to Arab causes, and eventually Arab songwriters composed not only for her but about her. One verse: "Lovers, oh night, have deserted their beds and gathered, oh night, and I among them. Yes, all of them left their beds and gathered to listen to Umm Kulthum."

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