"I always felt it was impossible for anything to happen with my music. Impossible. The fact that today Fakhr has 260,000 monthly listeners on Spotify is one of music's most unorthodox success stories, a mixture of luck, fate and years of convincing."
"In truth, it's a small miracle that the 71-year-old singer-songwriter is performing these songs at all, period. They're tracks he recorded nearly 50 years ago, in the midst of the Lebanese Civil War. He released 200 cassettes, mostly to friends; he only knows where three ended up."
"I can't believe all of you are here. This is crazy. I'm going to do my best, I swear. I'm only 250 years old. This experience - playing to a room full of adoring fans - is one that Fakhr is still adjusting to."
Rogér Fakhr recorded songs nearly 50 years ago during the Lebanese Civil War, releasing only 200 cassettes mostly to friends. After moving to the Bay Area in the 1980s, he abandoned his music career for decades. In 2021, a German record label called Habibi Funk reissued his cassette "Fine Anyway," sparking an unexpected revival. Today, Fakhr has 260,000 monthly Spotify listeners and performed his first U.S. concert at Rickshaw Stop in San Francisco, drawing crowds of fans half his age. He remains amazed by this unlikely success, having long believed his music career was impossible.
Read at SFGATE
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