Thread: Leila / Layla / Leyla - looking for more info

I have multiple versions of this song, and love it! However, all that I know about it is that it was composed by Farid Al Atrache. I'm assuming it was originally composed for a film - I'm wondering if anyone knows which film, and whether it's associated with a particular dancer? Google and Youtube have not helped me out on this one

TIA..g.:

I spent literally hours this morning trying to find info on this song! I find that amazing! Finally I stumbled across this:

https://www.hollywoodmusiccenter.com...Media/1733.mp3

https://www.hollywoodmusiccenter.com...guage=english&

I spent quite a bit of time looking myself this morning (but not as much time as I spent Wassoufing in vain yesterday!). I can't find much about it either. I even picked through his discography on his Arabic Wikipedia page, which has a table of his songs with a cross listing of the movies they're from (قائمة أغاني Ù�ريد الأطرش - ويكيبيديا، الموسوعة الØ*رة). There's "Al-leila al-nour" and "Ya mqabbil youm wa leila" written by him, but no song titled just "Leila." I'm wondering if it is part of a larger piece with a different name? I don't think the first one sounds the same, and the second one is definitely a different song.
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6bg71WfjIj8]YouTube - ‫الليلة النور _ÙˆØ*يد Ù�ريد_موسيقار الأزمان Ù�ريد الأطرش‬‎[/ame]
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w7s6ybpuRnQ]YouTube - ‫يامقبل يوم وليلة موسيقار الأزمان Ù�ريد الأطرش‬‎[/ame]

Such a famous song and I can't find any original clip! This is is a tribute on youtube.
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JxRe9EYdai0]YouTube - Mazen Salha playing Farid El Atrash[/ame]

Thankyou so much guys. I'm sorry you had a not-very-fruitful morning, but its reassuring to me to know that I'm not going out of my mind completely,r:;

Norma I hadn't found the HMC page - a lovely version of the tune.
Tourbeau - those are the same youtube clips I found earlier as well. The first one you posted I did dither over, but in the end decided it wasn't the same song.

I'm a bit shocked that there is so little info online for such a well known and well-used song.

The only other bit of (confusing, given the track is on a CD linked to Tahia Carioca) info I have is that the version that Diana Tarkhan uses on her choreography DVD, she refers to as 'Samia'.

..c::

I'm shocked as well. I ordered the Golden Age CD. Maybe the jacket will provide some more info, but apparantly the song is associated with Taheyya Karioka. I scoured youtube videos and came up with nothing.

It is odd that the song would be called Samia if it is associated with Taheyya!!!

The very first VHS tape I bought, Trytel Nights, has a clip with Nelli dancing to Leila. It is a nightclub setting (of course) and Farid Al Attrache is seated at a table with a young woman. Trytel gives the film title as Sigham Fee Hayati but I believe Nagham Fi Hayati is the correct title. It was released 1975, after Farid's death. The band I danced with most often usually played Leila as the opening number in my set.

Deelybopper,

I have this from a friend. The Arabic script says something about the movie name but I can't make it out.
YouTube - alatrashh's Channel

Originally Posted by Michelle75

I have this from a friend. The Arabic script says something about the movie name but I can't make it out.
YouTube - alatrashh's Channel

Okay, now we're making progress. It's from the movie "Ayza Atgawiz" from 1952. Apparently it's the theme as well. Farid's Arabic Wiki discography lists four songs from the movie, but this doesn't seem to be any of them, so the hunt for an official title is still on....
[ame="http://ca.video.yahoo.com/watch/5711215/14963771"]Ayza Atjawaj -Theme on Yahoo! Video[/ame]

Woohoo! All hail the awesome detective power of Bhuz!

Mervinw thanks for the info about Nelli.

Michelle75 - thankyou for that clip...I'd come across several clips from alatrashhs channel on previous searches, but would have had to hunt through systematically to find that one! But who is the dancer? Perhaps she is called Leyla???

Tourbeau - thanks for the clip of the opening credits of the film...I'm off to spend some time searching for more info!

Yes, at least we are finally getting somewhere!

Originally Posted by deelybopper

Woohoo! All hail the awesome detective power of Bhuz!

Mervinw thanks for the info about Nelli.

Michelle75 - thankyou for that clip...I'd come across several clips from alatrashhs channel on previous searches, but would have had to hunt through systematically to find that one! But who is the dancer? Perhaps she is called Leyla???

Tourbeau - thanks for the clip of the opening credits of the film...I'm off to spend some time searching for more info!

The credits on the movie page list her as Nour el Hoda. I searched her name and it appears she is an actress and not a dancer.
Someone in the comments of the clip I posted, called her Leila, so maybe that was the characters name or they have her confused with someone else. Not sure.

Yes, I too am also glad for all the above research! It's such a well known tune and so pretty, it's good to have some history.

Originally Posted by Michelle75

The credits on the movie page list her as Nour el Hoda. I searched her name and it appears she is an actress and not a dancer.
Someone in the comments of the clip I posted, called her Leila, so maybe that was the characters name or they have her confused with someone else. Not sure.

Thankyou!

But what's the connection to Taheyya?

Originally Posted by norma

But what's the connection to Taheyya?

At this point, your guess is as good as anybody's. From what we know so far, Farid wrote the music for this movie, and she's not it in. IMHO, that narrows down the most likely theories to "she liked the song and performed to it elsewhere" and "somebody made a mistake, because information is not easy to come by about this song."

Originally Posted by Tourbeau

At this point, your guess is as good as anybody's. From what we know so far, Farid wrote the music for this movie, and she's not it in. IMHO, that narrows down the most likely theories to "she liked the song and performed to it elsewhere" and "somebody made a mistake, because information is not easy to come by about this song."

I'm thinking the same thing.

..l;, It's funny that we've found this information but I'm still as confused as when I started.

Originally Posted by Michelle75

The credits on the movie page list her as Nour el Hoda. I searched her name and it appears she is an actress and not a dancer.
Someone in the comments of the clip I posted, called her Leila, so maybe that was the characters name or they have her confused with someone else. Not sure.

FYI Nour el Hoda was a famous actress AND singer from that time. She starred in Matoush'le7ad with Farid el Atrache and Samia Jamal.

Originally Posted by Michelle75

The credits on the movie page list her as Nour el Hoda. I searched her name and it appears she is an actress and not a dancer.
Someone in the comments of the clip I posted, called her Leila, so maybe that was the characters name or they have her confused with someone else. Not sure.

FYI Nour el Hoda was a famous actress AND singer from that time. She starred in Matoush'le7ad with Farid el Atrache and Samia Jamal.

Originally Posted by norma

I'm shocked as well. I ordered the Golden Age CD. Maybe the jacket will provide some more info, but apparantly the song is associated with Taheyya Karioka. I scoured youtube videos and came up with nothing.

It is odd that the song would be called Samia if it is associated with Taheyya!!!

I just got my CD! I highly recommend it if you like classic accoustic orchestration from the Golden Age. But, even though the CD is a tribute to Taheyya, there were 2 songs I recognized that were clearly not hers. One was the song Samia danced to in the movie with Farid where she is swinging on a swing and he is dreaming. The other, Sahara City is for Nagwa. So I'm assuming there probably is no Taheyya connection.

I reviving this post since I'm working on a choreography to Leila for my students and I like to give them background info. (Yay for bhuz, for making my job much easier!)

I was noticing on the clip of Nour al Hoda, the video is labeled "Algerian Leila dancing to the sound of musician times Farid al-Atrash" (ala google translate) and one of the comments says "Leila the Algerian had a unique look, these blue eyes said much. Farid was in love but refused to go to live in Egypt she was living in Paris. She was married with an Algerian singer and lived in Blida cha3bi has 50 km of Algiers." actually 2 of the comments one in Arabic and one in French said approximately the same thing.

So do any of you know, is that referring to the character in the movie?

The IMDB on Ayza Atgawwez confirms that Nour al Hoda was a leading actress in the film:
Ayza atgawwez (1952)

I'm searching my Trytel videos right now for the Nelli clip. Anybody run into anything else on this topic recently?

I posted Nelli's Leyla:

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VbmxWZGXyUs]YouTube - Nelli-Leyla-Trytel-1.mp4[/ame]

Originally Posted by shems

I was noticing on the clip of Nour al Hoda, the video is labeled "Algerian Leila dancing to the sound of musician times Farid al-Atrash" (ala google translate) and one of the comments says "Leila the Algerian had a unique look, these blue eyes said much. Farid was in love but refused to go to live in Egypt she was living in Paris. She was married with an Algerian singer and lived in Blida cha3bi has 50 km of Algiers." actually 2 of the comments one in Arabic and one in French said approximately the same thing.

So do any of you know, is that referring to the character in the movie?

According to Google, Rashid used to carry the movie "Ayza Atgawez" (maybe they still do, but the link is currently broken and no cache). The search returns this:

"Ayza Atgawez (1952) The Stars : Farid El Atrash - Nour El Hoda - Leila Al Jazaeriya- Soleiman Naguib - Abdel Salam El Naboulsi - Serag Mounir . ..."

Leila Al Jazaeriya is not listed in the IMDb page, but it would appear she is "Algerian Leila," the actress in the film whose name literally translates to "Leila the Algerian," not an Algerian character in the film named "Leila." (All of the other names on the Rashid list are at IMDb.) According to this site Wapedia - Wiki: Shadia, Farid got jiggy with more than one of his costars, and Leila Al Jazaeriya was on the list. (Too bad the Fareedelatrashh.com link is dead--might have been more info there.) At any rate, it looks like the comments are talking about a real woman who had a relationship with him, broke up, and married someone else and moved to Algeria, not something in the storyline of the movie.

So is the dancer in the clip Nour El Hoda or Leila Al Jazaeriya?

Hi Shems,
No it's not a character. Layla al Jazairiya was a golden era dancer. She is the dancer in this clip.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SMvaiZg-A9M]YouTube - ‫ليلى الجزائرية ترقص على نغم موسيقار الأزمان Ù�ريد الأطرش‬‎[/ame]

And this is Layla Al Jazairiya as well:

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9tuj8m5LGWk&feature=related]YouTube - Farid Al Atrash - Noura[/ame]

Originally Posted by shems

.....and one of the comments says "Leila the Algerian had a unique look, these blue eyes said much. Farid was in love but refused to go to live in Egypt she was living in Paris. She was married with an Algerian singer and lived in Blida cha3bi has 50 km of Algiers." actually 2 of the comments one in Arabic and one in French said approximately the same thing.

So do any of you know, is that referring to the character in the movie?

Originally Posted by shems

So is the dancer in the clip Nour El Hoda or Leila Al Jazaeriya?

I don't know. Nour has an Arabic Wiki page, but I can't find much information about Leila. Google images has the woman tagged as Leila in that scene.



Leila Al Jazaeriya (ليلى الجزائرية)





Nour al Hoda (نور الهدى)

Originally Posted by shems

So is the dancer in the clip Nour El Hoda or Leila Al Jazaeriya?

It's most definitely Layla Al Jazairiya. As far as I know Lebanese singer Nour el Hoda sang and acted. She was not a dancer. Here's a 1952 picture of Farid el Atrash and Layla Al Jaziriya on the cover Al Kawakib, an Egyptian movie magazine.

thanks!