Some artists define an era. Salma Mousfi lived through several—and made
music in every one of them, redefining each of them..

In this episode of Forward Moves, host Raja Haddad sits down in Paris
with Salma Mousfi—the Lebanese singer whose voice became inseparable
from Ziad Rahbani’s legacy through the cult classic album Monodose— to
trace a life that refuses to hold still. From rehearsing in bomb shelters as a
twelve-year-old in wartime Beirut, to belting Madonna covers that caught
the ear of Lebanon’s greatest musical genius, to recording a Bossa Nova
album inspired by her war-canceled move back to Beirut in 2006, Salma’s
story is one of constant reinvention driven not by ambition, but by sheer
necessity to live.

Salma didn’t plan to become a central figure of Middle Eastern avant-
garde music. She was just a teenager who had to sing to exist. What
followed—a decade-long collaboration with Ziad Rahbani, years of
stepping away from the spotlight to raise children and run a shop in
Grasse, a pivot to jewelry design in Paris, and now a return to the stage
with a tribute to the mentor she lost—reads less like a career and more
like a life fully inhabited.

This conversation explores what it means to carry a legacy without being
crushed by it. It’s about the politics of being a Lebanese woman expat
who reinvents herself not by choice but by circumstance. About recording
an album over one summer with two babies and no expectation it would
matter—26 years before it still does. And about why Salma believes every
musician who ever played with Ziad owes it to him to perform his music
live.

This episode explores:
• The Beirut that made her: Growing up during the civil war,
rehearsing in shelters, and why music wasn’t an escape—it was
proof of existence
• The discovery: How an 18-year-old singing Madonna covers at a
BUC concert caught Ziad Rahbani’s attention and changed
everything
• Monodose, unplanned: How Lebanon’s most beloved jazz album
was made with no expectations, two babies in tow, and a summer’s
worth of recording sessions
• The Salma sound: Emotional but never melodramatic—how she
learned to live the meaning of a song without letting it tip into
performance
• Salma as collaborator, not muse: The moments she pushed back,
and why Ziad listened
• Salma Nova: Writing a Bossa Nova album while displaced by the
2006 war—an expat’s love letter to a home she couldn’t return to
• Keeping Ziad alive: Why she believes his legacy must be performed,
not just streamed—and the 22-year-old musician from France who
might carry it forward
• Two homes: What it means to land in Paris and feel home, then land
in Beirut and feel home too

Salma’s story is a reminder that the most enduring voices aren’t the ones
that shout the loudest—they’re the ones that keep showing up, in shelters,
in studios, in borrowed apartments, on stage. She is proof that a creative
life doesn’t need a plan. It just needs the refusal to stop.
Tune in, subscribe, and join us as we chart the creative journeys shaping
the Middle East. Until then—keep moving forward.

Episode Timeline:
00:01:14 – Welcome & Introducing Salma Mousfi
00:03:05 – The Night Ziad Heard Her Sing
00:06:10 – Singing to Survive: Music in Wartime Beirut
00:08:37 – Musical Influences: Stevie Nicks to Astrud Gilberto
00:09:13 – How Ziad Structured Her Voice
00:12:44 – Recording Monodose: A Collaboration, Not a Commission
00:19:44 – The Birth of Salma Nova
00:24:11 – Women Expats and Constant Reinvention
00:26:43 – The Weight of Paying

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