The Birthplace of Raï — Algeria's second city on the Mediterranean where the raw, emotive music of Algeria's working poor evolved into an international sound, Albert Camus set The Plague, and the Spanish colonial architecture of the lower city sits behind a Moorish citadel
Oran is Algeria's second-largest city and its Mediterranean port — a city shaped by 400 years of Spanish occupation (1509–1792), French colonial architecture (1830–1962), and the musical revolution of raï (meaning 'opinion' or 'point of view' in Arabic). Raï originated in Oran in the 1930s–40s among rural migrants and working-class youth, blending Bedouin folk music, Andalusian influences, Egyptian pop, and French chanson into a rawly emotional genre that addressed sex, alcohol, and political disillusionment — taboo subjects in conservative Algerian society. Cheb Khaled (known internationally…
The site of Oran was settled by Berber tribes (called 'Ifren') before Arab traders from Al-Andalus established a trading post here in 902 CE. The Zianid dynasty (Tlemcen Emirate) controlled Oran from the 13th century. Spain seized Oran in 1509 (three years before Ferdinand of Aragon died) and held it — with a two-year Ottoman interruption — until 1708, when the Ottoman Bey of Algiers took the city. Spain retook Oran in 1732 and held it again until an earthquake in 1790 killed 3,000 people and the Spanish abandoned the city in 1792. The Ottoman Bey restored it as an Algerian city. France invad…