Album of the day: Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, “Shanen-Shah”
Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan
“Shanen-Shah” (Cd Real World RWCD 3)
In 1989 Shanen-Shah hit the music scene with the force of a burning meteorite, revealing to the Western world
the talent of Pakistani singer Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, one of the major exponents of the Qawwal style, religious music of the Sufis,
which had been performed by Nusrat’s family for over 500 years and of which he was the ambassador to the Anglo-Saxon public also thanks to the help of Peter Gabriel, who gave him ample space within his own record label.
The amount of albums recorded by Nusrat in his long career is enormous (over 120 titles) and has made him a true superstar in his country well before English and American listeners noticed his talent. Not only does his wide vocal range and technical ability place him among the greatest interpreters of the genre, but the beauty and expressiveness of his voice are able to reach even an audience not normally accustomed to listening to music of this type.
Over the years, Nusrat tried to fuse traditional qawwal music with rock and electronic music, collaborating with artists as diverse as Peter Gabriel himself (on the soundtrack of “The Last Temptation of Christ”), Michael Brook, with whom he made two albums, and Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam, always managing to fit into different musical languages without compromising his stylistic purity.
Qawwal music uses several choirs that interact with the solo voice and is traditionally accompanied by harmonium,
handclaps and percussions, starting from very simple and iterative melodic/rhythmic cells that soon develop and multiply into large melismas, bringing the musical temperature to very high levels with captivating results.
I remember a Nusrat concert in Turin where he literally hypnotized the audience with three and a half hours of irresistible music, making the audience dance and distributing vocal fireworks in an inexhaustible way without abandoning an absolute composure of behavior, interrupted only by big smiles when seeing people in the grip of the most unbridled enthusiasm. Tracks like “Shamas-Ud-Doha, Badar-Ud-Doja”, “Nit Khair Mansan Sohnia Main Teri” and “Allah, Mohammed, Char, Yaar” are the incredible expressive peaks of an album to be listened to quickly.
Carlo Boccadoro, composer and conductor, was born in Macerata in 1963. He lives and works in Milan. He collaborates with soloists and orchestras in different parts of the world. He is the author of numerous books on musical subjects.
This text is taken from “Lunario della musica: Un disco per ogni giorno dell’anno” published by Einaudi, courtesy of the author and the publisher.
