On a stadium-sized stage next to the Atlantic Ocean in Essaouira, Morocco, musician Omar Hayat is wielding a guimbri bass lute in front of a crowd of 20, maybe 30,000 people.
It’s the annual Gnawa and World Music Festival, billed as ‘the biggest jam session on the planet’ – a sprawling, largely free event, which is regarded as one of the top destination music festivals in North Africa and, arguably, the world. Young men, older women and selfie-taking teenagers chant along, football terrace style, to the music of this Gnawa maâlem, or master musician, the roar of their voices rising and falling with the sound of waves crashing against the town’s great stone ramparts.
