Enrico Macías... the expatriate Jew who loved Constantine and longed for his home there
Although he has been away from it for decades, his tender heart is still attached to it. He recalls its details from what stuck in his aging memory. He comforts his long or short nights with the smell of popular foods that flowed to his nose from its narrow streets like perfume, or from the sounds of copper craftsmen’s hammers. And they soften this yellow metal with their trained hands, or by the crackling of his shoes as he touches its roads set with granite stones, so it emits a melody that mimics his trumpeting ear, thus increasing his speed and riot, so that his laughter and the laughter of his peers may rise. Those sounds/melodies turn into a symphony performed by an orchestra of nostalgia and the burning of a return to the past, playing its childish and innocent melodies in the twists and turns of its alleys that extend in all directions, like a snake looking for shade or a spring of water.
Enrico Macias
It is the "city of passion and air" as the Algerian poet Mufdi Zakaria calls it, or the "city of hanging bridges" as it is famous, or the city that sleeps on a hanging rock as geologists know it, so it guards time and those passing through it and around it. Its name was once "Cirta", it was taken as the capital of the long-lived Numidian queen (from 202 to 46 BC), strong, terrified and prosperous, and at that time it included parts of the lands of Algeria, Tunisia, Libya and Morocco, so the kings clothed it with military and cultural glories, and political paths that did not erase it History, but the more time advances in it, the more luster, value, and exploits it has, to argue with its long history, every lengthy or prejudiced one.
Constantine, who gave him art and the boy's dreams
This is the city that carried Andalusian art on its shoulders for a long time, and completed what Andalusia started after its collapse and diaspora, and took the artistic workmanship from the Moriscos, so that this art became a milestone in the artistic heritage, not only in Constantine, but in Algeria as a whole, as the Algerian Jews had a pivotal role In its development, preservation and advertising would.
It is the city of "passion and air" as the poet Mufdi Zakaria calls it, or the "city of hanging bridges" as it is famous, or the city that sleeps on a hanging rock as geologists know it, so it guards time and those passing through it and around it.
There are many names that bear witness to this, among them Enrico Macías, whom this city gave birth to, and weaved with it a relationship of longing that does not wither or fade, and the more time progresses with it, the more his nostalgia for it increases, especially since he still lives far from it, and he only wishes to stand on it and smell it. its air and walking in its alleys, or its melodious voice that resounded in most cities of the world, as he used to do for her 62 years ago, when he was a young man in his twenties, radiating enthusiasm, health, excitement, handsomeness and dreams, following in the footsteps of his father Sylvain Grenasia (1914-2004), the musician He played the violin, from party to party, and from place to place, until he drank art, and he also became a member of the music choir that was led by Raymond Leiris (1912-1961), known as Sheikh Raymond, as was his father.
Enrico Macías and his father
Raymond is one of the important and pioneering artistic names in Andalusian music and the “familiar” in Constantine and Algeria as a whole, as he was a beloved artist from all segments of society, whether from the Jews to whom he belonged, like Sylvain and his son Enrico, or from the Arabs who were with him in the band, but He was liquidated by the National Liberation Front in 1961, after he proved his progress in working against the Algerian revolution (1954-1962), especially since he was involved in the French police service, which is the bad memory that Enrico Macías still retains until this moment, and he is not without it. A dialogue without mentioning it, but he always believed that the destiny of conflicts is to leave wounds and scars.
When Gaston Grenasia left Constantine permanently in 1961, he no longer felt safe, especially since he witnessed the death of the closest people to him, his teacher and sheikh Raymond, from whom he took the musical profession, to marry his daughter Susie Leiris in 1963 after settling in France, and she also left Constantine as Hundreds of Jews left it, who felt that they were not welcome in this city that had embraced them for centuries, especially since the signs of Algeria's independence appeared strongly at the time.
Paris takes Macías in her arms and presents him to the world
When Gaston settled in Paris, he called himself Enrico Macías, and in 1962 he sang many songs, including: “ Farewell, My Country, ” “ Chiquita ,” “ Go Away ,” “ Constantine ” and “ Shorleys Wanderers ,” and a year later, That is, in 1963 he released another series of songs: “Christmas There,” “A Summer Evening,” “My Friend, My Brother,” and “In the Heart of the Camargue.”
Enrico Macías, whom this city gave birth to, weaved with it a relationship of longing that does not wither or fade, and the more time progressed with it, the more his nostalgia for it increased, especially since he still lived far from it, and he only wished to stand on it and smell its air.
In 1964, he released the songs "Love for Nothing", "Don't Doubt Me Anymore" and "Maya". However, the song and his beginning, which constituted the different starting point in his career, in an environment and culture that is still new to him, but he adapted to it to the greatest extent, is the song “Paris took me in your arms”, which almost constituted a decisive turning point in his artistic career, through a global and new musical era in that. At that time, it became known as the era of yé-yé music, a neologism derived from the song by the British band The Beatles, which made music famous all over the world.
The term was modified from a song of theirs that included "Yeah-Yeah-Yeah" in some of its sentences, and then it became the process of converting some of the English-singing British band's songs into French. It is the tradition of that era, and among them Macias, who started his new musical journey in this way, so that the song (Paris, tu m'as pris dans tes bras) "Paris took me in your arms", is the opening of those songs that took him away, and introduced him to a completely different audience, He even sang with his soft throat at Carnegie Hall in New York at the age of 30.
He expressed this remarkable success by saying that it came by chance and without planning, and that despite his advanced age (85 years), he still carries a heart full of dreams: “I never planned for my success or my career. My drug is music, as it flows in my veins and in my heart. I want to sing as much as I can, until my last breath."
Old age and still in the heart sigh and heartbreak
Enrico Macias furnished his artistic path with more than 150 songs, the topics of which ranged from love, beauty, dreams, setbacks and other emotions, but the most discussed topics are his great love and his bitter regret over losing the city of Constantine in which he was born and lived in his childhood, adolescence and part of his youth.
He devoted many songs to her, and mentioned her explicitly or implicitly, aloud or secretly, with every heartbreak and every sigh, especially since his memory still retains the love stories he lived in this city, his recklessness and rioting with his peers, his first concerts, the art sheikhs from whom he learned. At their hands, the city’s alleys and hanging bridges, its caves and secret paths, its deep valleys, its foods that he still yearns for, especially the merguez (sausages), and his house in the neighborhood (Homet) of the Jews in which he lived.
Enrico Macías and his wife
This neighborhood was allocated exclusively to the Jews by the ruler Salih Bey during the Ottoman era in the year 1750, when he ordered the allocation of a place in the city of Constantine for the Jews, in order to ward off the problems and confrontations that were occurring between them and the Muslims, due to the repeated strife. Despite this, a major confrontation took place between them on August 5, 1934, when Enrico Macías was a child at the time, who did not exceed four years of age, and many victims fell between the two parties, which is the incident that is still being narrated, especially since 120 Jews fell.
Hanin Enrico Macias is different, because he has a very intelligent, strong, and sensitive memory, and although most cities in the world have opened their doors to him, Constantine is still difficult for him.
And the French colonialism lost control of this incident, which it was said that it was standing behind to create an identity between the Arabs and the Jews, for this reason it summoned and sought Abdul Hamid bin Badis, who issued an appeal from the Al-Katani Mosque and annihilated the sedition before it spread further.
Unforgettable stuck memories
Constantine remains always and forever stuck in the memory of the Jews, who spread and left in all the cities of the world, especially since they have memory and memories in them, and relatives buried in their cemeteries (more than 11 graves), but Enrico Macias’s nostalgia is different, because he has a very intelligent, strong and sensitive memory, and despite That most cities in the world opened their doors to him, but Constantine is still disobedient to him, not because it is a city that does not love its people, and does not celebrate their successes, and not because it is a racist city, but rather because Enrico Macías chose the side that he supports in his positions, and it is the side that the Algerians do not like. And they are hypersensitive.
Enrico Macias
Also, many of his statements were provocative to them and their feelings, such as what he said about the martyrdom of the symbolic child, Ahmed al-Durra, which he said was just a play, in addition to his material and financial support for the Israeli army, which collected donations for him, which are negative data that made a wide group of Algerians refuse his visit to Constantine.
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