Munir Bachir (1930-1997) was born in Mosul (Iraq), into a long established family of musicians.
His father taught him to play the Oûd at a very young age. He then spent six years studying at the Baghdad Institute of Music,directed by Sharif Muhyiddin.
Later, he completed a doctorate of musicology in Budapest.
As a passionate defender of Arab music, Munir Bachir was in constant rebellion against the misrepresentation of this music and its use for commercial ends.
He spent several years fighting to establish his lute as a solo recital instrument and travelled the world as a true ambassador for Arab classical
music, bringing it to specialists as well as to a larger audience and restoring credentials to a music that had become debased through bending
to the tastes of colonial nostalgia.
Faithful to the letter and the spirit of traditional Arab music, Munir Bachir improvised from fully authenticated sources. As much creator as performer, his music was forever evolving, never repetitive. Read more on Last.fm. User-contributed text is available under the Creative Commons By-SA License; additional terms may apply.