Hamza Shakkur

Hamza Shakkur (1944 – 4 February 2009) was one of Syria's foremost munshids of the later twentieth century, called 'the shaykh of munshids', singer of the Umayyad Mosque of Damascus and president of Syria's league of munshids. ^{1 2}

He was born in 1944 in the al-Qaboun quarter of Damascus. His father, a muezzin at the quarter's great mosque, took him to the mosque and to the Sufi lodges — the Rashidiyya, Hashimiyya, Rifa'iyya, Sa'diyya and Naqshbandiyya. He learned the adhan at ten; Shaykh Muhammad Hamza al-Qabuni discovered his voice and taught him tajwid, Arabic, poetry and improvisation, and he then joined the ensemble of Shaykh Sa'id Farhat, who taught him the arts of inshad and composition. ¹

In 1958 he first recorded supplications for television, and a national anthem during the union with Egypt. From 1960 he took up bodybuilding and weightlifting, winning the Damascus title in 1963 and the Syrian title in 1966, and was then appointed singer of the Ministry of Culture's Umayya ensemble, touring Europe with it. From 1974 he presided over Syria's league of munshids, which included Tawfiq al-Munajjid, Sulayman Dawud and Sa'id Farhat. ¹

In 1983 he founded a religious-song ensemble at the initiative of the French musician Julien Weiss, who had come to Damascus, embraced Islam and taken the name Jalal al-Din Weiss; it was named Al-Kindi after the philosopher Ya'qub ibn Ishaq al-Kindi. Shakkur built it a Damascene Sufi programme renewed every three years, and the ensemble toured from India to the United States with song and the Mevlevi ceremony. ¹

From 2001 he gave several concerts with Father Elias Zahlaoui to promote Muslim–Christian fellowship, and took part in international festivals. ¹

He died on 4 February 2009, aged 65. ^{1 2}

Wikidata listed an article on him in Arabic Wikipedia only on 6 November 2026. ²

• Arabic Wikipedia article, revision of 15 March 2023. ¹

• Wikidata item Q12208840. ²