The Best of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan Qawwal and Party Volume 1 (WOMAD/Oriental Star 1986)

About Qawwali:

Strong voices and explosive hand-clapping characterize
the devotional music known as qawwali. An
ensemble of usually 12 male performers conveys a
religious message through music and song based on
mystic poetry by Sufi masters. The texts usually deal
with divine love (’ishq), the sorrow of separation
(hijr, firaq) and the union (visal), these concepts being
symbolically reinforced and illustrated by the
music. Qawwali blends Iranian and Central Asian
poetic, philosophical and musical elements into a
North Indian base, combining popular music with
classical traditions. Following the same pattern of
combination and blending, the texts cover Arabic
and Persian, but the main text body is usually in a
simple idiom form of Indian languages: Urdu,
Hindi, Purbi and Punjabi. Qawwali is derived from
the Arabic word qaul, literally meaning “saying” but
has taken on the meaning of “belief ” or “credo” in
South Asian languages. Qawwali is spiritual in essence;
it is the devotional music of the Sufis to attain
trance and mystical experience—originating in the
10th century and blossoming into its present form
from the 13th century onwards.
Qawwali is inseparable from the name of a Persian
court musician, composer, poet and mystic of that
period: Amir Khusrau (1254-1325). Amir Khusrau
experimented with musical forms, combining the
Indian and the Persian, the Hindu Bhakti and the
Muslim Sufi to produce the present form of
qawwali.
Qawwali thus became a popular expression of
Muslim devotion open to all faiths throughout
Northern India. This form of music rapidly became
a vehicle for the Islamic missionary movement in
India, while at the same time reinforcing the faith of
the Muslims. In many cases, the original Persian
mystical text is followed by a translation in the local
idiom sung in the same manner as the original.
While the orthodoxy continues to reject what they
perceive as a blasphemous mixture of music and religion,
qawwali remains an expanding form of music
enjoying universal popularity in South Asia and
beyond. An even more energetic form of qawwali
developed around the 16th century in the middle
Indus at the crossroads between Iran, Central Asia
and India. This form, called the Punjabi ang, presents
the crystal-clear and profound texts of Punjabi
Sufi poetry and folk songs woven into attractive
melodies and powerful rhythms. The late Nusrat Fateh
Ali Khan belongs to this branch of qawwali.

http://hop.dartmouth.edu/assets/pdf/notes-qawwali.pdf

Tracklist:

01 Allah Hoo Allah Hoo
02 Yaad-e-Nabi Ka Gulshan Menka
03 Haq Ali Ali Haq
04 Ali Maula Ali Maula Ali Dam Dam
05 Mast Nazroon Se Allah Bachhae
06 Ni Main Jogi De Naal

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