Muslim-American Country Singer in Syria, Tours Middle East

DAMASCUS, Syria May 21, 2010? -- Country music has little of a fan base in the Middle East. The crowd of Syrians that filed into Tishreen Park was mostly propelled by curiosity for a rare concert of American music and a chance to meet Kareem Salama, reputedly America's first Muslim country singer.

Salama's concerts in Syria were among the stops on a one month tour of the Middle East arranged by the State Department's Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, part of a wave of cultural outreach to the Arab world.

"I wanted to introduce them to our music," said Salama in his Oklahoma drawl. "A lot of people come up to us and say they really, really like it."

Salama's parents immigrated to America from Egypt, raising a devout Muslim family enmeshed in southern U.S. culture, from football to barbeques and rodeos.

"I never felt like I was anything other than American, but I did know that my family had come from another place," he said. "I wasn't made to feel out of place."

On stage he mixes English and Arabic, joking with the audience and introducing his bandmates. Through their guitar solos and his lyrics to songs like "Picnics and Sunshine" he conveys a uniquely American sound and a Southern ease. In another song called "You Are Me," he pulls a common thread through two cultures.

"Middle Eastern man, do you know who I am? I'm a God-fearing man, and I love my land," he says, then roughly repeats the line in Arabic. The song ends with a riff mixing "Hallelujah" and "Hamdullilah," the Arabic religious phrase of giving thanks.

The audience is visibly stunned by the musical mixture.

"They hear him singing in Arabic and it's like - whoa wait a second, this is for us," said guitarist and music producer Dan Workman.

"And then he talks in an Oklahoma accent. He pops you out of your preconceptions."

After each show, new fans surround the visiting musicians asking for autographs. In Latakia, guitarists JJ Worthen and Mike Whitebread gave an impromptu master class, teaching new guitar chords to eager Syrian teens.