And what could be more enticing than a good beat combined with a good story!
I guess I like qawalli for the same reason I like Johnny Cash and Waris Shah. Remember, the ‘Paani ki qawalli’ and ‘Paisay ki qawalli’ (both by the Sabris) and the populist poetry extravaganzas of Aziz Mian ( which often were more Munni Begum than Aziz Mian).
Many purists consider them blasphemous not just because they moved qawalli from being predominantly religious – devotional to everyday-mundane. They were both major innovators of the qawalli genre. This was the era when the Sabri Brothers Qawall and Aziz Mian Qawall were at the peak of their prowess. I suspect that those around me thought it was rather odd that I liked qawalli so much but then, people around me have always considered me odd! I guess the beat was enticing, the stories interesting, and the qawals colorful. I don’t know why I was a fan no one else around me was. I was a qawalli fan while I was still in school long before there was a Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and long before it was kool to be a qawalli fan. I left wondering what has happening to qawalli in Pakistan today? Who are the big names out there? Are there any? Is there any Ghulam Farid Sabri, Aziz Mian, Nusrat Fateh Ali equivalent out there? I know of Rahat Fateh Ali Khan, but he seems to be mostly re-rendering Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan’s work. I guess she left wondering what the beat and sound was about. I am not sure if she heard what I said over the noise because the light turned green just then and we went our different ways. She shouted over the music to ask me what type of music this was and from where. As I stopped at a red light, my head still nodding to the rhythms, I noticed that the American woman in the car parked next to me was staring at me with a rather perplexed look (Bostonians don’t often get to hear the Sabri bradraan!). It is being reposted with the addition of some new Qawali video clips.Īs I was driving back from work tonight, I had an old Sabri Brothers cassette playing in my car. Other famous Qawwali singers include Pakistan's Fareed Ayyaz & Abu Muhammad, Abdul Habib Ajmeri, Rahat Fateh Ali Khan, Badar Maindad, Nusrat Fateh Ali, Rizwan & Moazzam Duo, the late Amjad Sabri and Bahauddin Qutbuddin and Aabida Parveen.This post was originally posted on October 19, 2006. Qawwali music received international exposure through the work of the late Pakistani singers Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, Sabri Brothers, and Aziz Mian largely due to several releases on the Real World label, followed by live appearances at WOMAD festivals.
Originally performed at Sufi shrines or dargahs throughout South Asia, it gained mainstream popularity and an international audience in late 20th century.
Many Pakistani website have great collection of Islamic qawwali mp3 download facility. It is part of a musical tradition that stretches back for more than 700 years. Qawwali is a form of Sufi Islamic devotional music originating from South Asia, and notably popular in the Punjab and Sindh regions of Pakistan in Hyderabad, Delhi and other parts of India, especially North India as well as the Dhaka, Chittagong and Sylhet divisions of Bangladesh.