Sleiman says Lebanon will commemorate Wadih el-Safi's death every year

Lebanese President Michel Sleiman said on Tuesday while offering his condolences to the family of Wadih el-Safi that Lebanon will commemorate the death of the legendary singer every year.   

Sleiman added that "Lebanon will not mourn Wadih el-Safi for he will remain in the memory of all the Lebanese people."               

Wadih el-Safi passed away on Friday October 11th at the age of 92.                      

Safi, whose real name was Wadih Francis, was born in 1921 in the Chouf village of Niha. He lived in near poverty in the village until his family moved to Beirut when he was nine.                                            
The son of a policeman and the second of eight siblings, Safi started his artistic journey at the age of 17 when he participated in a singing contest held by a Lebanese radio station where he placed first out of 40 contestants and began working at the station.                     

Following the competition, he began composing and performing songs that illustrated his rural upbringing and love for traditional melodies, and created a new style of modernized folk music.                
Safi helped spread colloquial Lebanese Arabic outside his country, becoming known to many Arabs as "the man with the golden voice."              

During a career that spanned over seven decades he worked with a string of legendary Arab composers and singers such as Egypt's late Mohammed Abdul-Wahhab, the late Syrian-Egyptian Farid al-Atrash and Lebanon's Fayrouz.