Interviewer: Mahmoud Mansi
Cover Picture: Mohamed Ahmed Photography
“Success is to be very flexible with the changes around you and being able to adapt your plans to them. In order to do this, you have to believe that your dreams are possible despite their difficulty, because if you don’t, others won’t also believe in them…”
Ahmed Mounib
ABOUT THE INTERVIEWEE
Ahmed Mounib is an Egyptian violinist & music composer. He has started his musical studies at the age of 7 and continued musical education till he got his bachelor of arts from Cairo conservatory. He played as a violinist at Cairo symphony orchestra for 3 years before he decided to travel to Germany to continue his musical studies where he got two master degrees in classical and jazz music from Munich Music University. During his studies he created two bands: Fouad & Mounib band in Egypt and Ahmed Mounib band in Germany. In both bands he introduced his own compositions for the violin, piano and other instruments as well. He performed in a lot of prestigious venues as a soloist such as: Cuvillies Theater in Munich and Cairo & Alexandria opera houses, and gained a lot of audience in the last years with his live performances and social media music videos as well. In 2019 he released his 1st Album with his own compositions with the title “Nostalgia in Blue” which is available as a hard copy and on online streaming platforms like Spotify, ITunes and Anghami.
THE INTERVIEW
1-HR Revolution Middle East Magazine: Mounib, every career and role is divided into technical and personal/social skills. As a violinist you have worked on developing yourself technically through rehearsals and academic achievements. What are the extra personal and social skills that helped you create your identity and brand?
Ahmed Mounib: First thing which comes to my mind when we speak about personal skills is discipline. Being a musician and especially a violinist is on the contrary of what people might think, it’s not an easy job at all or something that you just do for fun. You spend your entire life since your childhood learning and practicing a very complicated instrument in order to be a professional violinist after so many years. In my case I started my musical education at the age of 7 in Cairo Conservatoire, where I also got my normal school education, so the day was divided into 2 parts, school education and musical one, so you can imagine how a double study for a child could be irritating. I had to learn how to be disciplined in order to get things done. Violin needs daily hours of practicing all by yourself in a closed room and I think you can imagine how difficult this was for a 7-year old child as well. Another personal skill that helped me becoming the person I am is willpower. On my way I faced a lot of big challenges which could make me fall down forever, but I decided every time to be stronger and to put only my dream in front of my eyes. Social skills are very important in the profession life, especially for artists. You might have a big talent in what you do, but if you don’t go out to the world and show your talent with confidence you won’t get ever recognized no matter how good you are in what you do. In my case this meant more work on social media, because till the point I started to study my 1st master in Germany, nobody had ever heard about me or my music, but later on I started to post my music online and read a lot to learn about how social media works and how can you get more exposure and it completely changed my life as a musician. Since I started to get a big recognition on social media I got a lot of offers for prestigious live performances as well.
2-HR Revolution Middle East Magazine: Usually artists who focus more on “performing” are less concerned with “academic” degrees. You have accomplished two master’s degrees in the field, congratulations that’s a big achievement! Can you tell us more why you also focused on studying? And did this have any impact on your performance and practical career?
Ahmed Mounib: Well, let’s say it was my destiny to become a musician, since I come from an artistic family who noticed my musical talent at a very early age, so they got me enrolled in a professional music education. I decided later to go on with my musical education because I saw it as the most important tool which will help me get all the music inside of me to the world. I know a lot of talented musicians who have a lot of music inside them, but they couldn’t get it out, because they don’t have the right tools, so I just wanted to develop myself and my tools and didn’t think a lot about the master degrees as just a prestigious thing to have in my CV.
3-HR Revolution Middle East Magazine: Mounib, you have performed solely on stage and also in groups side by side with other bands and musicians. Do both types of performances require the same skills? What is the difference in terms of challenges and skills?
Ahmed Mounib: Actually we could divide it to 3 types of performances: 1st type is just when I play alone or with a small accompaniment, in this case I have a lot of freedom. 2nd type is where I play with my own band or my own orchestra, so I am the soloist and the composer, but I can’t just do whatever I want and forget about the others, I also need to give instructions and even conduct sometimes to get everyone together and make my musical ideas clear for the musicians and audience at the same time, so this is really the most challenging and difficult type. 3rd type is when I play as an orchestra member or as a small party in a very big group, it is theoretically the easiest, but when you are used to play a lot as a soloist and to be in the center of attention, the change of roles could be also very challenging and you need to value more the teamwork spirit.
4-HR Revolution Middle East Magazine: If the Violin is considered one of your Life Mentors, what did you learn most from it?
Ahmed Mounib: I learned patience, I needed long years of patience and continuity in order to finally be a confident professional Violinist. I also learned to invest, the more you invest in practicing, learning and developing yourself the further you will get afterwards.
5-HR Revolution Middle East Magazine: You have worked in Egypt and Germany; two environments that might seem different. When it comes to art and the audience, is it different as well?
Ahmed Mounib: Yes, there is a big difference. In Germany you are one of hundreds of thousands good musicians, so your chances to get exposed with your music is really rare, in Egypt you have really good chances if you are a good musician, you just need to bring up something different and have some intelligence to plan your moves to get exposed. German audience are more cultured musically, because most of them have studied music as a school subject at some point and going to concerts is part of the public culture there, which means also they are a very difficult audience to satisfy, on the contrary Egyptian audience are easier to satisfy because they didn’t study the academic side of music so their minds have a capacity to value music in a different way that is more related to their emotions and senses, so they will appreciate you a lot if you are good enough and will also appreciate your effort, and they are more emotional and loyal than German audience.
6-HR Revolution Middle East Magazine: Are the challenges you have faced in Egypt in building your career different than the challenges you have faced in Germany?
Ahmed Mounib: The challenges I faced in Egypt and Germany are of course very different from each other. In Egypt it was easier because it was about an audience and community I grew up in, so I knew what should be done and the steps were always more clear, but in Germany it was a totally new community for me, it took me really long to understand it and I am still learning a lot, as musician you need to understand your target audience very well to reach them with your music.
7-HR Revolution Middle East Magazine: Mounib, some organizations are currently providing arts and music workshops to their employees because they believe they have an impact on development and engagement in the workplace. Many other organizations consider this only as a “fun” activity. What is your opinion about these two concepts? And what is your advice to organizations to make the music workshop more effective in terms of teambuilding?
Ahmed Mounib: In my opinion music isn’t just a hobby you do to waste some free time and at the same time it’s not exclusive for professional musicians who studied it their whole lives. I think music should be taught to everyone in the childhood despite the path they will choose later for their future. There are a lot of studies about how music has a great impact on how brain functions and that musicians see a lot of things differently, and when we speak now about the importance of music to employees we have to know that music is all about teamwork, especially if we are talking about chamber music or different forms of ensembles, you can’t just take care of your sheet music and ignore the others. Even if you play your part perfectly, you have to open your ears and eyes and see what the others do and cooperate with them in order to play a great piece of music together. I think this is a great skill that everyone needs to learn despite their field of work.
8-HR Revolution Middle East Magazine: What is your personal definition of “success”? And what success tips you would like to share with others out of your own experience and philosophy?
Ahmed Mounib: Success is simply setting different targets (I like more to call them dreams) for your life and then putting logical and practical plans to achieve them, it also means to be very flexible with the changes around you and being able to adapt your plans to them. In order to do this, you have to believe that your dreams are possible despite their difficulty, because if you don’t, others won’t also believe in them. Success also can’t be reached with just a great dream and good planning, you have to work very hard and overcome many obstacles on the way and ignore a lot of negativity coming from others and don’t forget that discipline is the key for achieving what you dream of.
Thank you Mounib for inspiring us with your Violin,
And now with your Pen and Wisdom.
