Voices and Faces of the Adhan: Cairo (working title)

a documentary film about collective and individual voice, as seen through the lens of the 1,400 year-old oral tradition of the Muslim call to prayer

www.onlookfilms.com

3 Project Topic

4 Story Summary

7 Project Stage

8 Distribution and Marketing Strategy

9 Engagement

10 Interactive Elements

Project Details | February 2012

an On Look Films Production Voices and Faces of the Adhan: Cairo

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adhan: Muslim call to prayer muezzin: one who calls believers to prayer; recites the adhan

Project TopicContext & Global RelevanceVoices and Faces of the Adhan: Cairo tells the story of five muezzins living in revolutionary Cairo. Through the lives of five characters, the capital’s transformation takes place: through events in contemporary history including the Egyptian Revolution and the start of implementation of the Adhan Unification Project which intends to replace thousands of individual muezzins with a single voice, broadcast to Cairo’s mosques from a radio station.

In a time when the eyes of the world are turning towards the Middle East, our film will provide an insight into an overlooked aspect of a culture and serve as an intimate alternative to the floods of news-like material currently generated on Egypt and the Arab Spring. It is the mission of On Look Films and Voices and Faces of the Adhan: Cairo to reach across cultural divides and contribute to diverse intercultural dialogue towards creating a more peaceful world through stories that bridge the gap across cultural divides.

1,400 years ago a former Ethiopian slave recited the adhan from a rooftop in the city of Medina. Bilal was Islam’s first muezzin and the originator of the tradition of the adhan. To this day, muezzins emulate Bilal and call Muslims to pray using the same words.

In 2010, a significant change in this tradition began to take shape in Cairo, Egypt. The religious arm of the government began implementing what is known as the Adhan Unification Project, which consists of disallowing Cairo’s mosques from sounding their individual adhans in favor of replacing them with a single voice broadcast live from a radio station, transmitted to wireless receivers at each of the capital’s 4,000 officially recognized mosques.

Importance & NecessityBegun in the time of Mohammed, the tradition of the adhan is deeply ingrained in the everyday lives of each of the 20 million people living in Cairo. There are thousands of muezzins, with their own unique life stories, reciting the adhan from the 4,000 officially recognized mosques and the 30,000 other mosques in Cairo. Their voices define the famous soundscape of this ancient metropolis, yet aside from Bilal, the profession of muezzin, has gone unnoticed for over 60 generations; imams are well documented and honored throughout history, with particular attention paid to the mosques in which they serve, yet muezzins are hardly ever mentioned although their voices help define the mosque and neighborhood. No feature film has ever been made on the muezzins of Cairo, their individual voices and histories have never been recorded or described. This film will tell the personal stories of five muezzins and their families as their lives undergo crucial changes influenced by the contemporary historical events in Egypt including the Adhan Unification Project and the Arab Spring.

It is clear that the possible outcomes of the Egyptian revolution involve short and long-term changes in the country’s social order as well as in other regions of the world. An ongoing event of such importance deserves a profound study that does not only cater to the genuine but limited global necessity for immediate news coverage. Such mainstream approach may fall short in its long-term cultural assessment of the revolution and the Egyptian people and could contribute to the perpetuation of many preconceived notions on the region.

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We at On Look Films believe that most of the contemporary media generated on Egypt in the recent years as well as current media focused on the Egyptian chapter of the Arab Spring has overlooked many relevant cultural and human aspects of life such as the tradition of adhan, and the muezzins who have recited it in times of peace, upheaval, even war, and will always continue to do so. Documenting several transformative historical events as they occur, while giving international voice to the muezzins of Cairo for the first time in the history of the adhan, is the mission behind the rich narrative of the story we will tell. Without falling into the trap of over-romanticizing the culture, we perceive this film as an opportunity to contribute to an intercultural dialogue between the West and the Middle East by way of allowing for the subjective experiences of the muezzins to be portrayed on the screen.

Rationale: Reasons Why Our Team is Best Suited to Tell the StoryAside from the belief that shapes our mission, which puts forth the idea that besides being a Muslim practice, the adhan is also a human cultural characteristic of universal importance, the On Look Films team is best suited to realize this project due to our long-term commitment to the theme and to the relationships developed with our characters. Our access, which came as a result of this commitment, allowed for the gathering of footage since 2009.

We have been to Cairo three times during pre-revolution and pre-Adhan Unification Project. The connections we have established carry over to this day. Such exclusive access would be virtually impossible to gather had we decided to start shooting after the beginning of the revolution. Personal background is another asset; several of the On Look Films team members are Egyptian and much of the team is comprised of first generation immigrants to the United States. Each of us greatly values cultural diversity and intercultural dialogue, having experienced a great deal of cultural misunderstanding first-hand. This project creates the possibility for all people to experience the cultural manifestation of the adhan as it is today and creates a bridge whereupon future generations of Egyptians can connect with their cultural past and experience the adhan as it once was.

Story SummaryScope | Format & Length | Artistic ApproachVoices and Faces of the Adhan: Cairo will be shot in HD with an intended running time of 112 minutes. Inspired by the seminal of Godfrey Reggio’s Qatsi trilogy, James Longley’s Iraq in Fragments, Agnes Varda’s The Gleaners and I, the oeuvre of photographers Sebastião Salgado and Henry Cartier-Bresson, we propose to create a new grammar of images intended to evoke the sense that the adhan, like other forms of worship, is a universal cultural language, quintessentially human, that can be appreciated globally. Church bells, drum circles, and other forms of sacred music hold the essence of important characteristics of human behavior and deserve proper depiction. After 9/11, the adhan became associated with ideas that have no relation to its real meaning and beauty. As this concept is changing with the recent movements in the Middle East, Voices and Faces of the Adhan: Cairo offers an essential glimpse into a crucial aspect of a changing Middle East, a region of vital importance in the global scenario. The film will provide a much sought-after insight into the Arab experience as a wave of interest in the region effects the artistic world. Focusing on the ritual and history of the adhan in Cairo, as well

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as putting a human face to ancient traditions in the modern age, the film serves as a powerful antidote to modern stereotypes, helping to usher in a new grammar of images to be associated with the Arab world by demonstrating the universal value of the adhan, thus connecting individuals and groups across borders in geography, religion, and culture.

Story Structure | Scope | Point of ViewWe will follow our characters during these trying times, and with their collaboration, paint a portrait of a society on the verge of a new and unprecedented shift. The omniscient third-person point of view will be utilized, in which a panoramic view of both the actions and the inner feelings of the characters will be developed, gracefully interchanged with a very personal first-person point of view letting the viewer see through the eyes of the characters. With the intent to capture how time passes in Cairo each day, the film will be divided into five segments, each corresponding to one of the daily adhans. Segment 1: Fajr (Dawn Prayer)In the last moments of the night, roosters are heard crowing before the residents of Cairo awaken, before the sun can shed its first rays. Gradually, the darkness fades and the Fajr adhan is heard as it echoes throughout Cairo, reverberating slowly as the city opens its eyes to the dawn light.

Sheikh Shaaban, a proud muezzin, who for over 25 years has honored his calling and struggled to support his family of six, is promoted from his small village mosque to a large mosque in Cairo. As they pack their belongings to move from their village, Sheikh Shaaban and his family envision a better future in Cairo: Sheikh Shaaban will continue to exercise his pious devotion to Islam, and as a result of his promotion, support the dreams of his older daughter who will study to become a doctor.

Sheikh Said travels daily roundtrip 3-4 hours via public transportation to get to and from the landmark mosque where he has been the honorable muezzin for 8 years. He leaves home before his family even awakens and returns in time to tuck his youngest son into bed and read verses of the Quran.

In the Heliopolis (New Cairo) studio of internationally renowned artist Khaled, an argument takes place. Cairo Symphony Orchestra pianist Muhamed claims that the chaos of thousands of voices is beautiful, “when you hear them together, all this chaos, everybody is doing it at the same time [with] different tonalities, different textures of sound, different everything...there is something about it.” Khaled doesn’t skip a paint stroke as he argues the opposite, “I consider mosques to be one of the sources of noise in the city and that’s why I think microphones should be criminalized no matter how good the voices are.”

Segment 2: Dhurh (Mid-Day Prayer) A montage of muezzins calling the adhan, their voices layering over one another, creating a blanket of sound, which envelops the 83 square-mile metropolis.

From the offices of the Ministry of Al Awqaf (Ministry of Religious Endowment), the Deputy

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Minister explains the Adhan Unification Project: For the first time since the inception of Islam, in an attempt to purify and perfect the call to prayer, a single muezzin’s voice is to be broadcast from a radio station through wireless receivers in each of the 4,000 officially recognized mosques of Cairo, thereby also reducing the noise pollution in Cairo, and guaranteeing that a well trained vocalist recites the adhan each and every time.

Sheikh Mohamed is enthusiastic to be among the 24 muezzins chosen to recite the adhan under the new rules. He is also the first to recite it live from Radio Cairo as part of the Adhan Unification Project. The sound waves carry his beautiful voice to mosques throughout the city of Cairo in a variety of neighborhoods, each with its own social structure, bringing him newfound fame and pride, which he relishes.

Segment 3: ‘Asr (Afternoon Prayer)Sheikh Mohamed recites the adhan from the radio station and is heard on home and car radios, as well as from the loudspeakers of the nearly 100 converted mosques to date.

In Heliopolis, an upper class neighborhood, not more than a few blocks from Khaled’s art studio, a number of mosques resonate the voice of Sheikh Mohamed.

Sheikh Rabbea, humble and weathered, walks into the mosque with the devout, responding along with the crowd to the transmission of the adhan, which not long ago, he used to recite in this very mosque. Sheikh Rabbea worked as a muezzin for 22 years, and five years ago was relocated to this prestigious mosque, which in August 2010 was one of the first mosques to be outfitted with the wireless receiver as part of the Adhan Unification Project. Sheikh Rabbea walks over to the small black box inside a closet and gazes at this piece of technology, which has replaced him and other muezzins. Reluctant to agree with the unification he contemplates why his lifetime practice, to which he has been completely devoted, is being taken away from him.

Sheikh Shaaban poses an even stronger opposition, feeling as if he had been had: the Ministry promoted him to a mosque in Cairo, but now his career and his family’s future is in jeopardy as his mosque will be outfitted with the receiver. No one was given a voice; no one asked him or the other muezzins what they thought of the unification, he claims, “There is no Democracy!”

Segment 4: Maghrib (Sunset Prayer)The adhan is called by muezzins at their mosques and by those reciting from Radio Cairo. The Adhan Unification Project is at a standstill. People respond and pray in the mosques, at home, on the streets and in Tahrir Square whether they are getting tear-gassed, sprayed with water or not.

It turns out Sheik Shaaban wasn’t the only one who felt this way. Much of Cairo’s population felt the same way about various social issues. People rose up to be heard. A revolution began in January 2011 that toppled Mubarak’s 30 year regime. In the midst of teargas and demonstrations, the faithful muezzins continued to perform their religious duties as they had every day for 1,400 years, reciting the adhan in the streets, in the mosques, and from Radio Cairo.

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Just as one of the main methodologies of protest is call and response, so it also is part of the tradition of the adhan. 20 million people live in Cairo and each of them respond to the call to prayer in their own way. In a small neighborhood in Old Islamic Cairo, volunteer muezzin Sheikh Mohamed S, kind, gentle and teacher-like, brings a different perspective to the discussion. While talking about the adhan, he states “it doesn’t matter what religion you are from, the adhan touches people, people no matter where they are from react to the adhan, to human voices! All I want is for all of us in the whole world to live in peace.”

Segment 5: ‘Isha (Night Prayer) The adhan is the one thing that never changes. There is always an adhan happening somewhere in the world 24 hours a day. While the adhan travels with the sun and nighttime is once again upon Cairo, our characters’ journeys begin close. It is here that images of other religious traditions such as the Christian bells, Jewish horns, Native American drums, and Buddhist gong are interlaced with images of the adhan being sounded in a baby’s ear right after birth, of Sheikh Said’s oldest son standing up to perform his rite of passage into adulthood by reciting the adhan for the first time, and of Sheikh Shaaban looking at his young son with hope for the future, not only for his family and his faith, but also for his country.

Project StageWe are ready to begin principal photography. Three research trips have been taken to Cairo since August 2009, over 80 hours of footage have been gathered and 27 mosques and muezzins have been filmed, recorded, photographed, described, and GPS tagged as part of the character research and development for the documentary film, and which also inform the interactive elements of the project.

To complete the film, we need two months for principal photography and one year for post-production.

The following elements have been completed to date:• R&D: completed• Preliminary footage: completed (30 hours interviews & 54 hours B-Roll in Cairo)• Trailer & Extended Demo: complete• Locations: secured• Muezzins: 15 secured, 5 main• Interviewees: artists, musicians, architects and scholars: secured• Score: musicians: secured• Rights: all available• Territories: all available• Pre-sales: none

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Distribution and Marketing StrategyAudienceOn Look Films endeavors to reach a vast and heterogeneous audience, primarily the individuals accustomed to watching the evening news, PBS, History and Discovery channels.

Voices and Faces of the Adhan: Cairo comes in a time when people all over the world are turning their eyes to the Middle East. Our goal is to reach those who are interested, but are minimally informed about the region or the specific topics explored in the film. Voices and Faces of the Adhan: Cairo has the potential to serve as a complement to the mainstream media coverage of the ongoing events in Egypt as well as catering to a more specialized audience.

We would like to explore the film’s appeal to viewers of our generation; young and critical, college educated professionals with an acute interest in world culture and its place in both historical as well as social contexts. Additionally, we would like to explore the film’s academic potential of communicating with audiences of historians, ethnomusicologists, individuals and groups with an interest in cultural preservation, cross-cultural dialogue, linguistics, Middle Eastern studies, Islam and interfaith works.

Media Presence Since the project’s inception, we have been focused on and dedicated to marketing, establishing an online presence through OnLookFilms.com, e-newsletters, press releases, blogs, Facebook, Twitter, GFEM, Foundation Source Access, Vimeo, YouTube, as well as holding community events, through which we have been able to show our short films created as part of the ongoing project, thus generating vast interest and inspiring audiences to further investigate the themes in debate after the screenings and presentations.

With an eye toward the future, On Look Films will implement traditional and emerging models of marketing and distribution for the project. We plan to submit the film to regional, national, and international film festivals, having been approached by festivals such as the Washington, DC International Film Festival and the Dubai International Film Festival. Screenings are also sought at art-house theaters worldwide. Relationships are being pursued with theaters, including the Cairo Opera House (Cairo) and Gene Siskel Film Center (Chicago). Partnerships are established with Hartley Film Foundation, DePaul University, Cincinnati Art Museum, National Geographic’s All Roads Film Project, World Oral Literature Project co-located at the University of Cambridge and Yale University and are further sought with collections, television networks, cultural, educational institutions including PBS, AFI, Townhouse Gallery; a conversation has begun with the Smithsonian Institution as part of their Recovering Voices Initiative. Retail and internet distribution is being pursued with organizations such as SnagFilms and New Video. In-flight entertainment possibilities are being pursued with Continental Airlines and KLM for domestic and international flights. All forms of Video on Demand, Internet Downloading and other emerging technologies are also being targeted. Through our vast multi-platform distribution approach, we hope to reach the largest possible audience, shedding light on an ancient tradition while opening up the conversation about Islam and the Middle East. Voices and Faces of the Adhan: Cairo aims to document cultural history and contribute to diverse intercultural dialogue towards creating a more peaceful world.

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EngagementOutreach and engagement efforts began with the project’s inception, and have gotten stronger through consultation and workshop sessions with Kartemquin Films and Active Voice.

After screenings and events, we have found a variety of outcomes which will grow with the completion of the film. Participants have reported their understanding about Islam and the Middle East transforming through our events: some have stated they had no prior knowledge of this tradition which inspires them to ask deeper questions, to seek out further information and travel more, while others have shared personal stories about their experiences with call to prayer and other traditions along with their gratitude for our work, and yet others have reported being inspired to interview grandparents and read family histories and diaries.

We intend for participants’ worlds to be expanded and to create a space where dialogue is possible across social, political, and cultural barriers, wherein the audience members engage in their communities in ways that foster understanding and peace.

Community Presentations & Screenings 06/28/09 Elastic Arts, Chicago - Project presentation, screening films by international filmmakers 04/15/10 Art Academy of Cincinnati - Trailer screening, project presentation, discussion 05/01/10 Elastic Arts, Chicago - Project presentation, live adhan recitation, discussion, screening films by Middle Eastern filmmakers, curated by Medrar for Contemporary Art (Cairo) 05/06/10 East West University, Chicago - Screening of trailer, discussion with students 05/29/10 Cincinnati Art Museum, Art Academy of Cincinnati, Manifest Gallery - Project presentation, trailer screening, films from Middle East (Medrar), panel discussion 07/16/10 Palestine Center, Washington, DC - Screening of trailer, discussion 10/13/10 3C Gallery, Chicago - Project presentation, discussion, screening of trailer & short videos 09/14/11 Kenai Peninsula College, Kachemak Bay Campus, Homer, Alaska - Project presentation, discussion with students and public, screening of trailer & shorts 12/17/11 Fifth Annual Middle East Film Festival, Zeitgeist Multi-disciplinary Arts Center, New Orleans - Project presentation, screening of extended demo & shorts, discussion about the Arab Spring and its relation to the project 02/02/12 DePaul University, Chicago - Project presentation, screenings of shorts, panel discussion featuring Dr. Khaled Keshk Further Established and Developing Partnerships Arab American National Museum (Dearborn, MI), Egyptian American Society, International Voices Project (Chicago, IL), University of Cambridge’s World Oral Literature Project, Endangered Language Archive, Past Preservers (Cairo, UK, US), Media Burn Independent Video Archive, Harran Productions Foundation, Smithsonian Institution Further Potential Partners Living Tongues Institute for Endangered Languages: documenting languages worldwide, community-driven multi-media projects

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International Music Council: access to culture for all, unites organizations to build peace & cross-cultural understanding

United Religions Initiative: global interfaith alliances; convenes around culture and spirituality

BBC Save Our Sounds: creating a map of sounds in danger of becoming extinct: partner to expand map, donating GPS tagged adhan sounds Further Potential Activities Events celebrating oral traditions from a range of faiths, hosted by mosques, churches, temples, synagogues Conferences, workshops, and events: incorporate clips of film to discuss historic/cultural preservation, tradition v. modernity, ethnomusicology, Islam Cultural Preservation Campaign: online campaign using film clips to inspire people worldwide to share stories of their traditions and how they are preserving them

Interactive ElementsThrough the multi-platform approach of the project - documentary film, digital audio recording, and interactive multi-media installation - Voices and Faces of the Adhan: Cairo creates a visual, aural and visceral portrait of an ancient tradition in the modern world, reaching the broadest possible audience, preserving culture and providing new access to rich cultural and educational resources for generations to come.

Digital Audio Recording Although the city of Cairo is known as the City of A Thousand Minarets, it is in fact home to over 4,000 officially recognized mosques, each of which has at least one muezzin to call the five adhans of the day. While the purpose of this component is to supply necessary data to the other elements of the project - interactive digital library and multi-media art installation - a digital library will be donated to entities with predetermined interest including Egypt’s Center for Documentation of Cultural and Natural Heritage (CULTNAT), the Library of Congress, Rosetta Project, to be accessed via internet and hard copy for studied by scholars, anthropologists, theologians and musicologists worldwide. Relationships have already been established with Endangered Language Archive and University of Cambridge’s World Oral Literature Project. The scope of this endeavor is indeed vast: no project capturing an oral tradition of this scope has been undertaken since John Avery Lomax’s important work to preserve American folklore and folksongs.

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MediaNest: 3D Interactive Digital Library www.MediaNest.OnLookFilms.com | www.OnLookFilms.com/intro

On Look Films has already begun developing the use of digital technology to provide historical and informative materials through a web-based, interactive environment. MediaNest, our online archive and multimedia library that will host sound archives of the muezzins reciting the adhan from the mosques of Cairo along with many hours of raw video footage and images of the muezzins, mosques, and surrounding areas. This is intended to fully represent Cairo both visually and acoustically. On Look Films plans to implement additional interactive elements into MediaNest as it becomes increasingly populated with rich media content such as historical, biographical and geographical data for each media sample. Our goal is to constantly push the envelope to achieve innovative ideas and technologies so we can better display and present our content to the end user. With HTML 5.0 ready to be implemented as a standard in all Web browsers, On Look Films is looking ahead to the future: HTML 5.0 Web browsers support 3D environments, allowing On Look Films to combine a fully-rendered 3D map of Cairo with archival audio, video, photos into a self-guided online virtual tour filled with historical information. The viewer would be able to navigate through key sections of the 3D environment and discover audio, video and images by clicking on hot spots planted throughout the map.

Interactive Multi-Media InstallationUsing the content gathered during the digital audio recording process, a multi-media map of the city of Cairo will be installed in the exhibition space. Relationships with potential exhibition spaces are being developed with Townhouse Gallery in Cairo, the Mockbee in Cincinnati, Green Lantern Gallery in Chicago, Smithsonian Institution in DC. Unconventional exhibition spaces are

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also being sought such as enclosures in parks, archways and other locations with potential to enhance the acoustical element. Since each adhan will be recorded on location at the specific mosque, the respective sound byte will be projected from a corresponding mapped point (scaled at 1:200) and will be played at the exact time of day it was recorded, thus recreating the experience of the city-wide call to prayer that washes over Cairo.

The adhans will be projected from speakers hanging from the ceiling, forming an aural map of Cairo. A visual map of Cairo will also cover the ceiling; we are considering the use of a satellite map instead of a standard road map to visually represent the mosques as well. Each recording will start and end at the exact time as it was broadcast, thereby corresponding live to its originating point. Consisting of the five daily adhans, recordings will be replayed accordingly throughout the exhibition, with 20 mosques per each of the 200 speakers. Creating the multi-media installation will require 4 computers with 50 outputs each, using high quality sound interfaces or large format 50 channel sound boards, playback PA system, 200 speakers, 10 amps to effectively project sound in the exhibition space. Although each exhibition space is projected to be different, the installation requires a minimum of 2,000 square feet per location.

Photographs and written documentation of each muezzin and mosque will be displayed throughout the space in print and electronic media, as appropriate. Monitors throughout the space will feature clips of the film’s main and supporting characters.

Smartphone apps will be downloadable including behind-the-scenes content, content of 25 muezzins, successively chosen with each download, so no two friends will be likely to download the same content. One large wall will be dedicated to a live projection (or cost permitting: a touchscreen monitor) of MediaNest for exhibition participants to explore, enabling another layer of interactively experience Cairo on various scales in one location through the lens of the adhan.

Installation exhibitions and film screenings will be organized concurrently in the same city, with corresponding presentations, allowing simultaneous marketing.