El Maallem Mahmoud Guinia (المعلم محمود ﯕينيا or
المعلم محمود كينيا; also spelled Mahmoud Gania is a musician from Morocco

Morocco

Morocco , officially the Kingdom of Morocco , is a country located in North Africa. It has a population of more than 32 million and an area of 710,850 km², and also primarily administers the disputed region of the Western Sahara...

. He has appeared on a number of recordings, most notably with Verve

Verve Records

Verve Records is an American jazz record label now owned by Universal Music Group. It was founded by Norman Granz in 1956, absorbing the catalogues of his earlier labels, Clef Records and Norgran Records , and material which had been licensed to Mercury previously.-Jazz and folk origins:The Verve...

 recording The Splendid Master Gnawa Musicians of Morocco.

Family life

The Guinia family are from the costal town of Essaouira

Essaouira

Mogador redirects here, for the hamlet in Surrey see Mogador, Surrey.Essaouira is a city in the western Moroccan economic region of Marrakech-Tensift-Al Haouz, on the Atlantic coast. Since the 16th century, the city has also been known by its Portuguese name of Mogador or Mogadore...

, which is situated around 350 km south of Casablanca

Casablanca

Casablanca is a city in western Morocco, located on the Atlantic Ocean. It is the capital of the Grand Casablanca region.Casablanca is Morocco's largest city as well as its chief port. It is also the biggest city in the Maghreb. The 2004 census recorded a population of 2,949,805 in the prefecture...

. Mahmoud Guinia was originally the second son of the late and great master of gnawa music

Gnawa music

Gnawa music is a mixture of sub-Saharan African, Berber, and Sufi religious songs and rhythms. It combines music and acrobatic dancing. The music is both a prayer and a celebration of life...

, Maâllem Boubker Gania (1927–2000) and the famous clairvoyant and "moqaddema" Aicha Qabral. The first son, Ahmed, died as an infant. After Mahmoud was another son, Lahcen "Zitoune", who also died, then there is a sister, Zayda, who has followed in her mother's footsteps, and today also leads a band of sufi women. Then there is another brother, Abdelah, who is also a great master, there was a sister, Chmeia, who died a few years back, and finally there is Mokhtar, who is also a great master.

The origins of the family is West Africa

West Africa

West Africa or Western Africa is the westernmost region of the African continent. Geopolitically, the UN definition of Western Africa includes the following 16 countries and an area of approximately 5 million square km:-Flags of West Africa:...

, i.e. the area around the famous city of Timbuktu

Timbuktu

Timbuktu , formerly also spelled Timbuctoo, is a town in the West African nation of Mali situated north of the River Niger on the southern edge of the Sahara Desert. The town is the capital of the Timbuktu Region, one of the eight administrative regions of Mali...

 in present day Mali

Mali

Mali , officially the Republic of Mali , is a landlocked country in Western Africa. Mali borders Algeria on the north, Niger on the east, Burkina Faso and the Côte d'Ivoire on the south, Guinea on the south-west, and Senegal and Mauritania on the west. Its size is just over 1,240,000 km² with...

. The family were not abducted as slaves, as so many other Gnawa

Gnawa

The Gnawa people originated from North and West Africa; to be precise the ancient Ghanaian Empire of Ouagadougou .This name Gnawa is taken from one of the indigenous languages of the Sahara Desert called Tamazight...

 were, but were employed as soldiers in the sultan's army. They are regarded as the main exponent for the style of Essaouira, the souiri style, although Mahmoud Guinia is married to a woman from Marrakech

Marrakech

Marrakech or Marrakesh , known as the "Ochre city", is the most important former imperial city in Morocco's history...

, with whom he has two sons and a daughter. Both sons are rapidly on the way to become musicians and can be seen in the band at the annual Gnaoua World Music Festival

Gnaoua World Music Festival

The Gnaoua World Music Festival is a Gnawa music festival held annually in Essaouira, Morocco.The festival provides a platform for exchanges and a meeting point of music and dialogue between foreign artists and the mystical Gnaoua musicians...

 in Essaouira in June.

Works

Maâllem Mahmoud Guinia has put out a number of CDs, where the most famous was recorded by Bill Laswell

Bill Laswell

Bill Laswell is an American bassist, producer and record label owner....

 and Oz Fritz and featured the American saxophone player Pharoah Sanders

Pharoah Sanders

Pharoah Sanders is a Grammy Award–winning American jazz saxophonist.Saxophonist Ornette Coleman once described him as "probably the best tenor player in the world." Emerging from John Coltrane's groups of the mid-60s Sanders is known for his overblowing, harmonic, and multiphonic techniques on...

. Due to misunderstandings his name was spelled "Ghania", but the true spelling is Gania, which is in the passport and national ID.

Countless films and recordings have been done with this great Maâllem, who is one of the foremost in Morocco today, alongside his two brothers, Maâllem Abdelah Gania and Maâllem Mokhtar Gania, as well as the masters from Marrakesh in the Baqbou family, Maâllem Abdeltif Sidi Amara, the masters from Casablanca, like Hamida Bouzzou and Hamid El Kasri of Rabat

Rabat

Rabat , is the capital and third largest city of the Kingdom of Morocco with a population of approximately 650,000...

.