Tamino

Tamino is a Belgian singer/songwriter who rose to international fame in the late 2010s with his blend of dark, moody indie rock and classical Arabic melodic accents. Born and raised in Belgium and of Egyptian and Lebanese heritage, his sound reflects his own complex identity, and his idiosyncratic style soon made fans of artists like Lana Del Rey, who invited him on tour, and Radiohead's Colin Greenwood, who appeared on his debut album, 2018's Amir. Tamino followed with his sophomore set, 2022's Sahar. Basing himself in New York, he recorded his third album, 2025's Every Dawn's a Mountain, whose lead single "Babylon" previewed the LP's oud-based arrangements.Named for both Prince Tamino in Mozart's The Magic Flute and the Arabic word for "prince," Tamino-Amir Moharam Fouad was born in Belgium in 1996. He's the grandson of Egyptian singer and movie-musical star Muharram Fouad, who died in 2002. Several years later, Tamino found his grandfather's antique resonator guitar at a relative's home in Cairo and took it home to Antwerp to fix it up and play it. (He would later use the guitar on tour, although he quickly decided it was too fragile and left it at home.) At 17, he studied voice at the Amsterdam Royal Conservatory. His first single, "Habibi," appeared in 2016, but his music career was launched in earnest when he won a talent competition held by Dutch-language radio station Studio Brussel in 2017. By the end of the year, Tamino was being referred to as "the Belgian Jeff Buckley." Invitations to play at festivals rolled in, and after signing with U.K. independent Communion Music, he released the four-song Habibi EP in mid-2018. His debut album, Amir, followed on Communion that October. It included a collaboration with Colin Greenwood and appearances by the Nagham Zikrayat Orchestra. Tamino made his North American debut at the SXSW Festival in March 2019 and opened for Lana Del Rey in June. A deluxe version of Amir including demos and live tracks arrived in October, marking the one-year anniversary of the album. That year, Tamino also appeared in Vogue magazine and in conjunction with clothing designer Missoni's SS19 Collection (with Gisele Bündchen) as a model; he performed one of his songs during Paris Fashion Week festivities. After two years off the radar during the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, he returned with the single "The First Disciple" in April 2022. He resumed touring that June, and his second album, Sahar, was released by Communion that September. In the period that followed, Tamino toured the album and performed a special concert at the American University in Cairo, Egypt. He also relocated to New York, where he teamed up with producer Eric Heigle (the War on Drugs, Arcade Fire) to record his next album. With a lushly textured arrangement based around the Arabic oud, 2024's "Babylon" was representative of Every Dawn's a Mountain, which followed in March 2025. It featured a guest spot by Mitski on the song "Sanctuary."
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