Ziad Rahbani^{[lower-alpha 1]} (Arabic: زياد الرحباني, born 1956) is a Lebanese composer, pianist, playwright, and political commentator. He is the son of Fairouz, one of Lebanon and the Arab world's most famous singers, and Assi Rahbani, one of the founders of modern Arabic music.^[1]

His compositions are well known throughout the Arab world. He became by far the most influential Lebanese artist during the civil war. Many of his musicals satirize Lebanese politics both during and after the Lebanese Civil War, and are often strongly critical of the traditional political establishment.

Ziad Rahbani is the son of the Lebanese composer Assi Rahbani and Nouhad Haddad, the Lebanese female singer known as Fairuz.^[2][3]

Rahbani was married to Dalal Karam, with whom he has a boy named "Assi" but he was later found out not to be his biological son. Their relationship later ended in divorce, prompting Karam to write a series of articles for the gossip magazine Ashabaka about their marriage. Rahbani composed a number of songs about their relationship, including "Marba el Dalal"^[4] and "Bisaraha".^[5]

Rahbani has a long-standing relationship with Lebanese leftist movements, and is a self-declared communist. Furthermore, in an interview with the journalist Ghassan Bin-Jiddu, Rahbani stated that the bloodbath massacres in the Palestinian camp Tall a-Za’tar by extreme-rightist Christian militias in 1976 was the main reason that drove him to leave to West Beirut. Notwithstanding, he also expressed his support to the Lebanese resistance and its project in the face of "the Israeli occupation and its Zionist Apartheid regime".^[6][7] Coming from a Christian family, his politics and viewpoints have meant that he has been at odds with some of his right-wing teenage surroundings.^[8] During the Lebanese civil war, Rahbani resided in the religiously mixed, West Beirut suburbs.

Rahbani's first known artistic work was "Sadiqi Allah" (My Friend God), a collection of writings between the years 1967 and 1968 when he was in his teens. In 1973, at age 17,^[9] Rahbani composed his first music for Fairuz, his mother. Assi Rahbani, his father, was hospitalized and his mother Fairuz was to play the leading role in Al Mahatta by the Rahbani brothers. Mansour Rahbani, his uncle, who had written the lyrics of a song about Assi Rahbani's forced absence, gave Ziad Rahbani the task of composing its music. The song "Saalouni El Nass" (People Asked Me)^[10] gained Rahbani recognition in the music world.

Rahbani appeared for the first time on stage in Al Mahatta where he played the role of the detective. He also appeared later on in the Rahbani Brothers' Mays el Rim^[11] in the role of one of the policemen. Rahbani's first step into theatre was with the Bkennaya Theater in Sahriyyeh.^[12] He followed that with highly politicized string of plays. "In 'The Harvest of Thorns: Political Comedy Theater in Syria and Lebanon,' Aksam Al-Youssef wrote,"Under these circumstances, as a young adult, Ziad imposed himself on the artistic scene as a playwright, director, composer, pianist, and actor. In a short time, his original theatre would become the center of attention for young people who found in it the voice of a lost generation caught in the throws of war and violence.^[13]

As an actor, besides appearing in his own plays, Rahbani starred in Randa Chahal Sabbagh's 2003 film The Kite.