Search - Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan :: Imprint: In Concert

Nusrat, Khyal Gayeki, and Qawwali.

Nehal Masood | USA | 02/25/2000

(4 out of 5 stars)

"University of Washington and Seattle is fortunate that Ustad Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan was able to spend some time as faculty member at the ethnomusicology department in the early nineties. This album represents some of the recordings from a faculty musical evening held at the university campus in Seattle. One of the magnificent and rare events was raag "Gawati", which unfortunately is not included in this album somehow. Nusrat sparkled the evening with this magical raag and later rendering his typical traditional work. However this is probably one of his best-recorded work both form the Gayeki and quality of recording aspects. In traditional Qawwali session, usually the performer starts with devotional items such as Qaul, Qalbana, Hamd, Naat and Manqabat, moving on to the areas of his specialized interest later. In this evening Nusrat started with a Khyal of a beautiful raag (Gawati) with excellent accompanying tabla and harmonium, with marvelous laye and taal through out the alaap and tarana. The same spirit of excellence (technical and devotional) has been carried over through out the other items included in this album such as Manqabat and Hamd. There is a little echo one can hear through out the recordings, but amazingly this only makes the magic of Nusrat's voice more mystical. This piece of work by Nusrat as a teacher shows his command over the various difficult aspects of Khyal Gayeki especially when assimilated in Qawwali. Qawwali and traditional Khyal Gayeki are very different technically, but they share the same content of devotional forms mainly depicted in the Bols (symbolic words). His style closely resembles that of Patiala and Sham Chorasi Gharana mainly (taans and bol-bant), and sometimes a hint Agra Gharana(handling of Sargam). Overall this is a good piece representing Nusrat virtuosity."