The eight-day festival will be held in Roskilde City.
It will feature Nadah El-Shazly (Egypt), Saint Levant, Shabjdeed, and Al-Nather (Palestine), Bedouin Burger and Sanam (Lebanon), and the rock band TootArd (Syria).
Performing with a full band, Egyptian musician El-Shazly will take the Gloria stage on 5 July.
El-Shazly began her music career as a member of Sick Gdrch, a Misfits cover band, but later moved into electronic music and jazz.
In these genres, she combines elements of traditional Middle Eastern music, harp playing, and expressive vocals in a personal style.
She rose to success with her debut album, Ahwar (2017), which led to her performances at important festivals such as the Netherlands’ Le Guess Who? and Rewire.
She continued to perform at prestigious venues and festivals worldwide, including Irtijal (Lebanon), Best Kept Secret (The Netherlands), FIMAV(Canada), Copenhagen Jazz Festival, and Texas’ Marfa Myths.
In 2022, El-Shazly won the Best Original Music award at the Bordeaux International Independent Film Festival and the Dublin International Film Festival for her music for the French-Moroccan film Les Damnés Ne Pleurent Pas (The Damned Don’t Cry).
She also composed music for the Saudi film Last Party in the R. Desert! and the Palestinian film To a Land Unknown in 2024.
Her latest track, Kaab Aali, was released on 3 April. It is part of her upcoming second album, Laini Tani, which will be released in June.
Marwan Abdel-Hamid, known by Saint Levant, was born in Jerusalem to a Palestinian-Serbian father and an Algerian-French mother.
He gained fame in 2022 with the success of his single Very Few Friends.
In 2023, he released his first EP, “From Gaza, with Love,” in which he sings in Arabic, English, and French.
His 2024 debut album, Deira, featured songs primarily centred around Palestine, expressing his vision of a “free Palestine.
In February 2024, the multilingual artist released his EP Love Letters, which consists of six songs. Each of these has garnered millions of views on YouTube.
Saint Levant will be performing on 4 July on the Eos stage.
Shabjdeed and Al-Nather, from Palestine's Ramallah, will take the Apollo stage on 2 July.
The duo stand out as key figures in the Palestinian hip-hop scene, following the release of their debut album Sindibad El-Ward in 2019, which gained massive success in the Arab world.
Through their music, songwriter and vocalist Shabjdeed and music producer Al-Nather depict life in Palestine under the occupation, delivering it in Palestinian slang.
Their most recent track, Tal Abib (2024), has amassed over four million views on YouTube.
Bedouin Burger, comprised of Syrian vocalist and composer Lynn Adib and renowned Lebanese multi-instrumentalist and music producer Zeid Hamdan, is set to perform on the Gloria stage on 3 July.
Hamdan is known for collaborating with numerous well-known artists and bands, including Soap Kills, The New Government, Katibe 5, Shiftz, Hiba Mansouri, Marie Abou Khaled, Tanjaret Daghet, and his project Zeid and the Wings.
In 2019, Hamdan produced the sound of the Oscar-nominated film Capernaum by Nadine Labaki.
Adib, who acquired her singing skills from a young age, has a diverse repertoire singing traditional Arabic music (maqam), ancient Syrian religious songs, and jazz.
The Syrian-Lebanese duo blend classical and Arabic folk music with modern influences.
They released their debut single Taht El Wared in 2020 and their first album, Ma Li Beit, in 2024.
Sanam band was formed in 2021 at Beirut’s Irtijal music festival by German musician Hans Joachim Irmler.
It blends elements of free jazz improvisation, experimental noise rock, and traditional Arabic poetry.
The Lebanese band, composed of four male and two female members, gained international recognition with its debut album, Aykathani Malakon (2023).
The concert, which will take place on 3 July on the Gloria stage, is part of Sanam's Europe and Canada tour.
Syrian rock band TootArd will return to the Roskilde Festival on 4 July (Apollo stage) after it performed at the 2023 edition.
Hasan and Rami Nakhleh, the two brothers behind TootArd, have come from the occupied Golan Heights.
They craft music that fuses Arabic disco and funk with musical traditions from North Africa.
In 2024, TootArd collaborated with Adib to release their song Ya Qamar.
Their album Migrant Birds (2020) showcases retro synthesizers, 80s-style drum machines, hypnotic beats, and Middle Eastern scales.
Roskilde Festival, founded in 1972, is one of the largest music festivals in Europe.
It was Denmark's first music-oriented festival, created initially for hippies; yet today it attracts more mainstream youth from Scandinavian countries and the rest of Europe.
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