From the center of Cairo’s now famous Tahrir Square to as far away as America, songs in support of the Egyptian uprising were performed, sung and uploaded throughout the days of protest in January and February.

As protesters camped in the downtown square, musicians ranging from little-known amateurs to some of Egypt’s top underground bands took to the stage that had been erected there. For years, Egyptian artists and musicians often self-censored in a bid for acceptance and media coverage, stifling creative expression in a country once known as the cultural capital of the Arab world. Now, their songs of protest are no longer tempered by fear of the ruling authorities.

“Erhal, Erhal” (“Leave, Leave”) and “Yescot, Yescot Hosni Mubarak” (“Fall, Fall Hosni Mubarak”) became a chorus for the revolution accompanied by verses of Egyptian grievance belted out from the stage and crowd.

One band that performed regularly during the protests was Eskenderella, a young, left-wing rock band, who first became popular covering the songs of Sayed Darwish and Sheikh Imam – an Egyptian singer who spent years behind bars for criticizing the regime.

Eskenderella have long been shunned by official venues, though bandleader Hazam Shahin says they found freedom of expression within the walls of smaller, little-known places, which attract a select, politically minded audience.

“I went to Tahrir Square because I felt it was my duty,” Shahin says, adding that most people gathered there had never been exposed to the type of music performed by Eskenderella. “We were reaching a new audience that had never heard us before. It’s not your everyday pop music, but the reaction was positive.”

Under a massive banner reading “Leave” in Arabic, Karim Adel Eissa – a member of the Egyptian hip-hop group, Arabian Knightz – sits with a group of other artists and musicians on a curb in Tahrir Square. “They were using the whole emergency law against people to leash them,” says Eissa. “But now you can see what the people are doing: If they want to say something, they’re going to say it. They are not scared anymore. The whole fear factor is gone.”

The Arabian Knightz used the uprising as an opportunity to air songs they were already working on. Amid the unrest last month they released two new tracks. For the first – “Rebel”, which samples Lauryn Hill’s song of the same name – Eissa wrote a new verse inspired by the events of January 25th (the “Day of Rage”), explicitly calling for the sort of uprising that weeks before couldn’t even be whispered about.

But there is stiff competition for the title of Egypt’s ‘revolution song.’

Hany Adel of Wust el Balad, a popular Cairo rock band, and Mohammed Mounir, one of Egypt’s most-famous singers, each made their own contributions, with the latter’s ode to a new Egypt, “Ezzay 2011” attracting 300,000 hits on YouTube.

The protest songs didn’t make it onto the airwaves of state-controlled radio, but when the internet was restored to Egypt in the second week of the uprising, they flooded social media sites. Photos and videos of the uprising accompanied the music, which was quickly spread through Facebook and Twitter – the sites that played such a key role in facilitating the revolution in the first place.

“Everything in this uprising is very spontaneous. They are putting new lyrics to old music – lyrics that have to do with the revolution – and some people have been creating new music,” says Egyptian actress Moataza Salah, who also attended the protests.

While the heavy restrictions on freedom of expression seemed to have been lifted in the last few weeks, it’s unclear if the curtains will remain drawn. The ousting of President Hosni Mubarak was followed by the installation of a military government – a far from reassuring sign for artists.

“That’s why one of the changes we are trying to push is not just a change in government, but a change in the media,” says Eissa. “It’s not just an uprising against this regime, but an uprising against all sorts of power and capitalism.”

Eskenderella’s Shahin says the problem is not the transitional military regime, but the shallow music and arts scene that evolved under decades of repression and is now so deeply embedded in Egyptian society.

“This new situation is only temporary,” Shahin says. “My main concern – even more than freedom and a change in government – is the history of mediocrity in Egyptian arts. The challenge will be to open channels for diverse music to reach new audiences.”

For now, though, most Egyptians are just happy to be out with the old, even if there is a lot of unknown in the new. “We’ve been empowered to speak,” raps hip-hop artist Omar Offendum, in a song titled “January 25” – a collaboration between five Arab-American musicians. “And though the future is uncertain/At least it isn’t bleak.”