The award winning Ras Nas aka Nasibu Mwanukuzi is a musician and poet from Tanzania living in Oslo, Norway. Ras Nas repertoire is a mixture of reggae and soukous (or rather, muziki wa dansi) with lyrics in both Kiswahili and English. The music is self composed as well as self arranged. Ras Nas’ line-up of musicians seasoned and international. Currently, his band comprises of musicians from Norway, Sweden, Ivory Coast, Congo Brazzaville and USA.

Among his merits is performing for Nelson Mandela and sharing the stage with musical heavyweights such as Van Morrison, Lou Reed, Bob Dylan as well as reggae legends like Linton Kwesi Johnson, I Jah Man and Eek a Mouse, to name but a few. Ras Nas has so far produced three critically acclaimed albums: Cut You Loose (1997), Dar-es-Salaam (2007) and Double Focus (2010). In 2010 he was awarded the Tanzania Red Carpet Award for best solo artist.

Ras Nas has participated in many prestigious festivals and has also toured extensively in Scandinavia. Among the festivals are the Spring Festival 2010 in Cairo and Beirut (Egypt and Lebanon), Norwegian Wood, Oslo World Music Festival, Lahore Performing Arts and Music Festival (Pakistan), Galle International Music Festival (Sri Lanka) and Oslo Mela Festival.

In addition to producing CDs, Ras Nas has also published a collection of poetry “Double Focus” and some of his tracks have appeared in international compilations. One of his poems “Mandela” is used in an educational DVD for High School students in USA and several others have been published in anthologies and magazines around the world.

Ras Nas at Spring Festival 2010 in Cairo and Lebanon
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Ras Nas in Cairo and Beirut. Spring Festival 2010Ras Nas is one of the headliners at this year's Spring Festival which is held simultaneously in Egypt and Lebanon. Ras Nas plays at Sunflower Theatre in Lebanon 14th May and at El Genaina Theatre in El Ashar Park in Cairo 15th May. Ras Nas ' line up include Urie Seri (Ivory Coast, drums), Chuck Frazier (Texas, lead guitar), Larry Skogheim (Norway, bass), Dag Pierre (Sweden, rhythm guitar) and Karlos Rotsen (Martinique, keyboards).

The Spring Festival is organised by Culture Resource Organization (Mawred) in cooperation with the Cultural Co-op for Youth in Theatre and Cinema (Shams). The festival will present a large group of artists and authors from 15 countries presenting their work for the first time in Egypt.

Other artists are dub poet and musician Benjamin Zephaniah (UK) and Thandiswa (South Africa) as well as Omar Sosa (Cuba/Spain).The program also includes many theatre performances such as "City of Mirrors" by the Lebanese Director Roger Assaf. The play is inspired by the paintings of the artist Paul Giragosian (1926 – 1993) and by the documents on Jerusalem before 1948. Ziya Azazi the famous Turkish dancer and choreographer will present is contemporary dancing performance titled "Dervish" in Cairo and Beirut.


This year, the Spring Festival includes a sub- program, titled “Tomorrow”, which will be held at Le Veinnois Hotel and Rawabet Theatre in Down Town. The program includes theatrical performances, art exhibitions, literary readings and film screenings by a large group of young Arab artists who have received production support from Culture Resource.

“Tomorrow” will open on Sunday the 9th of May with the solo performance “Squeek” by Kholoud Nasser (Lebanon) followed by " Upstairs" by Jad Hakawati and Roaa Bzeih ( Lebanon) on the 10th of May. The program continues till the end of the festival on the 22nd of May.