Ziad Rahbani, renowned Lebanese musician and composer and son of Fairouz, has died at the age of 69.

Lebanese musician and composer Ziad Rahbani, son of Arab song icon Fairouz and pioneer of oriental jazz, died on Saturday, July 26, at the age of 69, after revolutionizing the world of song and theater in Lebanon. "At 9 a.m. on Saturday, the heart of the great artist and creator Ziad Rahbani stopped beating," the hospital where he was being treated in Beirut said in a statement.

Musician, composer, and director, Ziad Rahbani has influenced generations of Lebanese people with his songs and, above all, his plays, whose lines are known by heart by both young and old. A visionary, his plays have evoked the civil war even before its outbreak in 1975, the small wars it has been involved in – "A Long American Film" in 1980, which takes place in an insane asylum – and the economic crisis.

The country's political leaders paid tribute to the enfant terrible of Lebanese music, known for his bohemian lifestyle and who suffered from health problems.

Ziad Rahbani is the son of Fairouz, the last living legend of Arabic song, and the composer Assi Rahbani, who, with his brother Mansour, modernized Arabic song by blending classical Western, Russian, and Latin American pieces with Eastern rhythms.

Adored by her elders, Fairouz also became an icon for young people when Ziad composed songs for her influenced by jazz rhythms, what he called "oriental jazz." While Fairouz transcends the powerful sectarian divides in the country, her son has chosen to be resolutely left-wing and secular, denouncing throughout his life the sectarian divisions that have ruined Lebanon.

"I feel that everything is over, I feel that Lebanon has become empty," wrote Lebanese actress Carmen Lebbos, who was his partner, on X on Saturday when Ziad Rahbani's death was announced.

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun called him "a living conscience, a voice that rebelled against injustice, and a sincere mirror of the oppressed and marginalized."

"Lebanon has lost an exceptional and creative artist, a free voice who remained faithful to the values of justice and dignity" and who said "what many did not dare to say," Prime Minister Nawaf Salam said. "We feared this day would come, because we knew his health was worsening and his willingness to seek treatment was weakening," Culture Minister Ghassan Salamé wrote on X.