Mayssa Jallad

Mayssa Jallad from Lebanon is both a singer-songwriter and an architect and researcher. Rather than leading to a career crisis, this engendered a unique project. Jallad has converted her thesis into the concept album Marjaa: Battle of the Hotels, referring to the battle lasting several months in 1975, during the Lebanese Civil War, which took place in Beirut’s chic hotel district. The ruins of the huge buildings would split the city in two for decades. In her songs, Jallad embodies the buildings as the fighting surges over her. The titles read like dispatches from the front lines: Holiday Inn (March 21 to 29) or Haigazian (October 22). Armed with an electric guitar and sharp eyewitness accounts, Jallad unearths a piece of complex Lebanese history without taking sides. ​​​​​​​