US-based artist Saint Levant explores his Palestinian identity through music

DUBAI: A chameleon in terms of identities, California-based part-Palestinian musician Saint Levant has had many names. However it’s his present alias that’s taking him to world recognition as a younger musician talking straight to the individuals.

Born Marwan Abdelhamid in Jerusalem, Saint Levant’s mission is to dismantle the outdated notions some individuals have of Palestine. For Abdelhamid, who spent a few of his youth rising up in Gaza, the reminiscences of Palestine nonetheless carry heat emotions, regardless of the horrors that led to his household having to go away.

“The precise cultural make-up is my mother is half-French and half-Algerian. My dad is Serbian, half-Palestinian. They usually truly each grew up in Algeria. However they determined, within the early 90s, put up the Oslo Accords, that Palestine was going to be free.

“So that they went again, my dad went to stay in Gaza within the early Nineteen Eighties. And my dad truly constructed a lodge there and that’s the place I grew up, I grew up in a lodge  constructed with my father’s architectural mind. And, to me, it was like the perfect years of my life,” mentioned the singer who turned 22 final month.

“For everybody, like childhood may be very significant. And for me, it was a juxtaposition as a result of I keep in mind the sound of the drones and the sounds of the bones. However greater than something, I keep in mind the heat, and the odor of … and the style of meals and simply the odd feeling of soil.”

As a musician and artist, Abdelhamid says he desires to stroll within the footsteps of Palestinian-American mental Edward Stated to “reclaim the Orientalist fantasies which have dictated the geopolitics of our space for the final three centuries.”

This yr, Abdelhamid additionally introduced the 2048 Fellowship, which covers the dwelling bills of a younger Palestinian inventive for an entire yr.

“Palestine is such a giant a part of my id. I all the time really feel very misplaced, all the time. You already know what I imply? And I feel one of many solely instances possibly in my life that I didn’t really feel misplaced was in Gaza.”

He mentioned that he even composed a tune, “Vacationer,” that expresses how he feels when he travels again to his birthplace. “I really feel like a vacationer in my very own metropolis. I do know (if I) return, I’d really feel like a vacationer. So yeah, my music will also be naive, nostalgic,” mentioned Abdelhamid.

Abdelhamid has spent the previous few years targeted on his activism which additionally noticed him achieve 1000’s of followers on TikTok. However round 2021, he was left with a selection of music, activism or a startup that he had been engaged on.

“I made a aware resolution final September that I’m gonna be a musician, as a result of I don’t wish to be 80 years outdated and look again at my life and remorse the truth that I didn’t give it a attempt. And I heard this quote the opposite day, ‘leap, and the online will seem.’ And identical to that, all the things fell into place.”