Middle Eastern Diva

Dikla, a 27-year-old Israeli singer who fuses electronic sounds with Arab pop—she grew up in Beer Sheba, listening to Egyptian radio—made her North American debut this summer at Lincoln Center in New York. The sexy young woman slunk about the stage in a shimmering yellow satin gown, whipping around her abundant black hair as her voice slid up and down the scales in Middle Eastern mode, after the style of the famous Egyptian singer Um Kultum, one of Dikla’s major influences, she says.