Munir Bashir was an Iraqi-Assyrian musician and oudist who was born in 1930 in Mosul, Iraq. He began his musical training at age five under his father, Abd al-Aziz, learning the cello and singing before specializing in the oud. At age six, he entered the Baghdad Conservatory, where he studied until 1946 under Safi al-Din al-Hilli and specialized in documenting traditional musical styles. In 1953, Bashir moved to Beirut, where he performed as a soloist for the singer Fairuz and gave his first public solo concert in Istanbul that same year. Following several European tours, he settled in Budapest in the 1960s and earned a doctorate in musicology from the Franz Liszt Academy of Music in 1965, studying under Zoltán Kodály. In 1973, he was appointed to the culture committee of the Iraqi Ministry of Information and served as a cultural representative for Iraq. Known for elevating the oud to a solo concert instrument, Bashir’s recordings include the albums Oud Around the Arab World (1993) and the collaboration with his son Omar Bashir, Duo de 'ûd (1994). Bashir died in 1997 in Budapest.
