Salah Ragab, The Cairo Jazz Band – Egypt Strut

After the Arab-Israeli War, Ragab became a major in the Egyptian army and had unprecedented access to the military's 3,000 musicians in Upper and Lower Egypt, as well as to a wide range of instruments. Part of the barracks was renamed Jazz House, and after a crash course in jazz history by Geerken, the Cairo Jazz Band was born, giving its first concert at American University's Ewart Memorial Hall in 1969. Inspired by Sun Ra & His Arkestra's first visit to Egypt in 1971, Ragab recorded an album for the Egyptian Ministry of Culture a year later titled "Egyptian Jazz," which was later released as "Egypt Strut" - a perfect blend of jazz and Arabic modes with tracks referencing Islamic festivals, Egyptian landmarks, and friends and family close to Ragab's heart.

Francis Gooding of TheWire sums up the album as follows: "Esoteric African-American Egyptianism and radically spiritualised modal jazz, which Ragab takes up as a tool for a form of mystical Egyptian nationalism - atriumphalist military jazz aligned in Ra-like fashion with the gods of the New Kingdom."