Alsarah & the Nubatones
Born in Khartoum and based in Brooklyn, singer and ethnomusicologist Alsarah reinvents Nubian "return songs" with her band The Nubatones: a retro-pop from East Africa, dancing and full of memory.
Alsarah was born in Khartoum, Sudan. In 1989, after the coup, her family left the country for Yemen, before settling in the United States in 1994. Trained in ethnomusicology at Wesleyan University, from which she graduated in 2004, she made Nubian music — that of the "songs of the return" of the populations displaced by the construction of the Aswan Dam — the heart of her art.
In 2010-2011, she founded Alsarah & the Nubatones in Brooklyn with percussionist Rami El Aasser, Oudist Haig Manoukian, bassist Mawuena Kodjovi and sister Nahid in chorus. The band named his "east-african retro-pop" style: nubian and Sudanese pentatonic melodies worn by irresistible retro grooves.
Their first album, "Silt" (2014, Wonderwheel Recordings), received an international welcome. After Haig Manoukian's death in 2014, his student Brandon Terzic took the oud. Suit "Manara" (2016), hailed by the critic, then tours that led the NPR Tiny Desk band to KEXP studios and on the scenes of more than ten countries.
In February 2025, the band released its third album, "Seasons of the Road", which opened its repertoire to English with titles such as "Bye Bye". In 2026, PBS's American Masters documentary series devoted a film to Alsarah, "The Sonic Historian", a brilliant recognition of an artist who had a nubian heritage and contemporary creation.
Biographie
Alsarah is a singer and ethnomusicologist born in Khartoum and based in Brooklyn. With the Nubatones — Rami El Aasser, Brandon Terzic, Nahid and Mawuena Kodjovi —, a New York-based band, she invented a retro-pop from East Africa with Nubian roots. Their first album, Silt, was released in 2014 by Wonderwheel Recordings.