Mohamed Iguerbouchène

Mohamed Iguerbouchène was the oldest of 14 children born to Saïd ben Ali and Sik Fatma bent Areski. He attended a primary school in Algiers. For his secondary education, he claimed to have studied music theory at a Norton College, in London. When he was 15, he crossed paths with Earl Fraser Roth, who found himself inspired by the obvious talent of the young Mohamed and decided to help him in his further studies. In 1922, with the generosity of Fraser Ross, Mohamed traveled to Manchester, where he enrolled in the Royal Manchester College of Music.

Iguerbouchène attended the prestigious Imperial Academy of Music in 1924 in Vienna for one year. In 1925, at the age of 18, he performed his first concert in Bregenz, Lake Constance. He exhibited his talent chaining works of his own directory like Kabylia Rapsodie n. 9 and Arabic rapsodie n. 7. The culmination of his early years of work resulted in his winning his first prize of harmony, counterpoint, and piano instrumentation. In 1934, after several successful symphonies, Mohamed was introduced to the Société des auteurs, compositeurs et éditeurs de musique (SACEM) as a songwriter, and in that same year he was also introduced as a member of the Société des Auteurs et Compositeurs Dramatiques (SACD).

Iguerbouchène was fluent in 18 languages including Russian and Japanese. In France, at the école normale des langues orientales de Paris, he was a student of Professor Destaing, where he studied Tamahaq, Tachawit and Tashelhit.

After some time, Iguerbouchène shifted his focus to compose for the cinema as opposed to symphonic music. After a few documentaries (Aziza) and a short film (Dzair), Julien Duvivier asked him to collaborate for the soundtrack of Pépé le Moko, a film whose main role was played by Jean Gabin. This film was the catalyst behind Mohamed's career as a film composer. The two artists shared the composition of the soundtrack in association with Vincent Scotto. (On the film's credits his name appeared as "Mohamed Ygerbuchen".)

In 1938, he met the singer Salim Halali in Paris (who was originally from Annaba), who helped Mohamed to compose fifty songs, mainly in an Arabic Flamenco style. The collaboration was successful in Parisian clubs and they also toured the rest of Europe. They were in particular very popular in North Africa.

Following his approach to the BBC, in 1939 it broadcast one of his orchestral works, a 'Moorish Rhapsody', which was conducted by Charles Brill.[1] Some listeners thought that he was a Russian composer, which earned him the nickname Igor Bouchen. In 1938, he composed songs with Vincent Scotto for the film Algiers. Because of Iguerbouchène's success in music direction, he was hired in 1940 by Paris Mondial to compose music for 20 short films for Mercier Film Inc. film studios. In early 1945, he composed about 100 songs based on poems in Thousands Nights by Rabindranath Tagore. In 1946, he composed music for, Les plongeurs du désert by Tahar Hannache.

Iguerbouchène composed for the 1962 French short Le songe de chevaux sauvages, directed by Albert Lamorisse about wild horses in France.

• Katz, Ethan B.The Burdens of Brotherhood: Jews and Muslims from North African to France, Harvard University Press, Harvard, 2015.
• Ounnoughene, Mouloud Mohamed Iguerbouchène: Un Oeuvre Intemporelle, Dar Khettab, Algiers, 2015.

• Mohamed Iguerbouchène on IMDb
• The Criterion Collection page
• Mubi page
• The Med-Mem Project 1988 documentary from EPTV