What is chgouri, or Moroccan rai music?

Rai is the rebellious pop of the Maghreb, and Morocco shares fully in it because the music straddles the border with Algeria. It grew up in the Oran–Oujda borderlands of the early twentieth century, starting as the earthy sung poetry of Bedouin shepherds and the bawdy songs of the cheikhas, female singers in the bars and markets. The word rai means opinion or point of view, and from the start the music was known for speaking its mind.

Over the decades rai went electric. Synthesisers, electric guitars, drum machines and the darbuka were layered onto those folk roots, and a wave of young singers — the chebs and chebas, meaning young men and women — turned it into a hugely popular dance music in the 1980s. The lyrics are direct and often daring: love, heartbreak, desire, exile, drinking, the frustrations of young life, sung in colloquial Arabic with raw feeling. In Morocco the eastern Oujda region is the heartland, and local styles, including ones linked to the chgouri sound, give it a particular flavour.

The sound is instantly danceable — driving rhythms, soaring melismatic vocals, catchy hooks, and that distinctive call of “ya-rayah” or “ya rai” threaded through. At a Moroccan wedding in the east, rai will fill the floor; on the radio and in cafes it is everywhere; and modern artists keep fusing it with pop, hip-hop and reggaeton so it never stands still. It is the sound of contemporary, youthful, urban Morocco far more than the trance and classical traditions.

For travellers, you do not seek rai out so much as let it find you — in a grand taxi’s stereo crossing the eastern plains, blasting from a cafe in Oujda, or at any lively celebration. If your trip takes you to eastern Morocco it is the unmistakable soundtrack, and it is a great reminder that Moroccan music is not a museum — it is alive, loud and constantly reinventing itself.