KARIM NAGI is a native Egyptian who specializes in traditional Arabic music and dance. He uses his traditional foundation to re-imagine the culture, discovering progressive deliveries and new concepts. Karim performs Arabic, Turkish and Andalusian hand percussion, including the Egyptian Tabla (goblet drum), Riqq (tambourine), Duff (frame drum), and Segat (brass castanets), as well as melodic instruments like the Buzuq (long lute) and voice. Karim has authored instructional CDs and DVDs including the first DVD resource on Riqq technique. Karim is a former faculty member of the New England Conservatory of Music. Karim leads the SHARQ Arabic Music Ensemble performing the classical Arabic instrumental and vocal repertoire. Karim travels the country presenting his education program called Arabic Music, Dance and Culture to school grades 2 up through the university level. Karim developed and currently performs Turbo Tabla : a music and dance show that combines traditional Arabic and Turkish music with modern Electronica and Techno. Turbo Tabla CDs are distributed internationally by Universal Records. Karim performs and teaches Arab Folk Dance including Dabka (line dance), Tahteeb (cane dance) and Zikr (religious movement ceremony). He lead the Zaitoun Dabka Troupe for 2 years, and is currently the director of the Arab Dance Seminar, a travelling weekend of workshops for professional training in pan-Arab dance. He also produced 53 concerts for the Arabesque Mondays series at Club Passim and would bring Arabic performers from all over the USA to perform at this famous folk club in Harvard Square.

Karim came to the USA with his parents in the late 1970's. His father brought him back to Egypt every year to visit his family. After graduating from Skidmore College with a degree in Psychology and three regularly performing bands, Karim traveled to India, Turkey, Eastern Europe and back to Egypt for an extended time. Karim returned to America in 1995 and began performing exclusively Arabic Music. His first teachers were Nabil Ata and Midhat al-Rashidi (Midhat had performed extensively with Abdel Halim Hafez and Firqat al-Massaya.) Karim later studied with Simon Shaheen at the Arabic Music Retreat and learned advanced Riqq from Michel Baqlouq (Fairuz ensemble.) Karim returned to Cairo to study Arabic Music in Cairo with Dr. Alfred Gamil (Cairo Conservatory of Music) and Mohammed Al-Araby (percussionist for Umm Koulthoum and The National Orchestra of Egypt.) Currently Karim Nagi has a blossoming career in Cairo with recent (July '07) performances at the prestigious El-Sawi theatre, and a live performance on the #1 rated Egyptian talk show "Al Qahira Al Youm" with host Amr Adib.

Karim participates in many activities outside of the Arabic Music and Dance context. Karim was a widely published fashion writer and has produced many fashion shows. Karim is also a visual artist who has worked in the advertising field, designing CD art and magazine ads, as well as art for its own sake. Karim is presenting his original artwork in the Fall 2003 performances of ReOrientalism, a multimedia play about the societal relations between the Near East and the West.