Music today: four voices from the south-east

Meteor Airlines is a band formed in 2016 at Kelaat M'Gouna by musicians from Tinghir; they call their music “Amazigh rock” and sing in Tamazight and Darija, on rhythms of the south-east, from the ahidous to the izli. On 13 February 2020, the anniversary of 13 February 1933 according to Amazigh World News (the sources give several dates for the start of the fighting), the band released “Warru”, in memory of the victims of the Bougafer; “Tawada” recalls the workers recruited for the French mines, a theme also found in the timnaḍin collected by Azergui. The album “Agdal” (2024) is devoted to the environmental knowledge of Amazigh communities, to oases and water, and is described by the press as a call for climate action.

Tenalt is the band founded in 2008 by Idriss Tichoua, known as Ider, from Ifri in the commune of Souk el Khemis Dadès (Tinghir province). Ider claims “committed song and meaningful words”: clandestine migration, illness, rights, freedom and, after the Al Haouz earthquake, “Izuz Wakal”, in tribute to the victims. He describes himself as coming from a region “marginalised in every field” and criticises festivals for reducing Amazigh art to folklore.

Ismail Titaou, a singer and guitarist born in 1990 in the Mellab area near Tinghir, started in 2008 with the band Free Life before going solo. He takes up the ahidous, notably the ahidous taqburt, in present-day arrangements (“Asaka”, 2022; “Taqburt” and “Tamurt inw”, 2023) and says he uses it to make Amazigh causes known and to convey pride in belonging to that identity.

In 2025 the band Taymat released “Ayyur”, the moon, a video that blends the ahidous tagzumt with contemporary writing and highlights the dress of the Aït Atta tribes, presented as a symbol of belonging; the article that presents it calls for preserving this dress, which is in decline. It says neither where the band comes from nor who its members are.