Diwane is more than just a music genre; it is a socio-cultural practice, a form of music therapy and redemption. It emerged many centuries ago, following the arrival in the Maghreb (Algeria, Morocco and Tunisia) of the first waves of black slaves brought in by the slave trading caravans travelling through Ghana, Timbuktu, Abalessa, Mali, Guinea and Sudan.
The origins of a black African community in the Maghreb can be traced back as far as Sultan Ahmad al Mansur of Morocco’s conquest of the Songhai Empire in western Sahel in 1590. The sultan took advantage of civil strife in the empire and dispatched his army across the Sahara to conquer and pillage, bringing north several thousand men and women as slaves and servants.
Great pain and suffering was the inevitable result of the uprooting and enslavement of these diverse populations, who in exile took on a collective identity that gave birth to a new form of expression. Like any art, it was used to exteriorise feelings, voicing the torments of slavery and exile and serving as a reminder of motherland, ancestors, and prevailing social injustice. It gave birth to the Diwane in Algeria, the Gnawa in Morocco and the Stambali in Tunisia, all of which have more similarities than differences.
