Why is Umm Kulthum famous?

Umm Kulthum was an Egyptian singer, lyricist, and film actress who was born Fatima Ibrahim es-Sayyid el-Beltagi on December 31, 1898. The honorary title “Kawkab el-charq” (‘Oriental Star’) was bestowed upon her. She is known as “The Voice of Egypt,” “The Lady of Arabic Song,” and “Egypt’s Fourth Pyramid” in Egypt.

Umm Kulthum was born in the Nile Delta village of Tamay e-Zahayra, Dakahlia Governorate, to a religious family, to her father Ibrahim El-Sayyid El-Beltagi, an imam from the Egyptian countryside, and her mother Fatmah El-Maleegi, a housewife.

She learned to sing after watching her father educate her older brother, Khalid. She was a natural singer from an early age.

Why is Umm Kulthum famous?

Umm Kulthum produced about 300 songs during her 60-year career, and her lines of love, grief, and longing can still be heard in cabs, radios, and cafes across the Arab world 45 years after her death.

Despite singing difficult Arabic lyrics, she influenced some of the best vocalists in the West. There is no western equivalent to Umm Kulthum, no artist as renowned and liked in the Arab world as she is.