For the best experience, we recommend using a modern browser that supports the features of this website. Qawwali is a form of devotional music that expresses the mystical Sufi practice of Islam in South Asia, mainly in areas of Afghanistan, Pakistan and India. Its main function is to make the listeners understand the words or message of the songs. When there was no Earth, no universe, No moon and sun, and no heaven When the secret of being was not revealed, When there was nothing, there was only you.
A typical traditional place of performance is at the shrine of a Muslim saint. Here, sitting on the ground and facing the tomb of the saint, the musicians perform for the saint, his representatives, his devotees and other Sufis.
The audience listens intently to the songs, and when one is affected emotionally by its message, he may suddenly raise his arms, stand, or even rise to move about in a kind of spiritual or ecstatic dance. Qawwali is performed by soloists who specialize in singing these songs with the accompaniment of a chorus and instrumentalists.
The modern form of Qawwali, stripped from its authenticity, is thus left almost impotent in terms of its capability to deliver spiritual achievement. Along with the new context in which the medium is being used, Qawwali has acquired new qualities and characteristics as a result of its different purpose and impact on its users.
Today, Qawwali reveals a sound culture that revives musical recollection of pre-partition Punjab and has a capacity to subvert the religious, nationalistic and territorial competition. By partly disconnecting from its religious element, it incorporates a broader scope of ethnic identification. Qawwali has been absorbed by a marketable practice to appeal to an audience in diaspora. With the advent of sound recording, Qawwali initially catered to Indian and Pakistani immigrants but soon spread further to appeal to secular audiences with an eclectic taste.
In films, Qawwali is largely used to emulate and substitute Indian folk music. Consequently, Qawwali is no longer necessarily performed under the banner of an Islamic narrative. Instead of being the centrepiece of the film or other mediujm, Qawwali is mixed with other eye- and ear-catching mechanisms, such as choreographies and elaborate costumes.
Nusret Fateh Ali Khan and A. Rahman are pioneers of popularized Qawwali. Their music, though it consists of the same themes of love, seems to precisely turn the hearts away from the spiritual to worldly love. Original Sufi tropes manifest just as powerfully, but they are now overcome by an increasing market demand for novelty and sensuality, resulting in Qawwali being further removed from its initial sacred purpose.
By dissecting the interrelated nature of sounds, themes, structure, context, purpose and impact of Qawwali as a medium of technology, one can begin to draw a more comprehensive understanding of the historical, evolving and modern roles of Qawwali music and performance.
Ever-changing and dynamic, Qawwali is particularly volatile. Qawwali cannot be reduced to the component of music that exists within it. Cultural, religious and political implications are part of the inherent warp and weft of Qawwali as a system of communicating values, attitudes, meanings and emotions. Perhaps the nominal meanings of Qawwali, along with its general musical style, are the only common elements remaining with authentic Qawwali. She is interested in methodologies of media transmission and the application of media studies in Islamic fields.
Abbas, Shemeem Burney. Aqlaynah, al-Makki. Bhattacharjee, Anuradha and Shadab Alam. Burckhardt Qureshi, Regula. Cambridge University Press, Jan. Dhahabi, Shams al-Din. Espositi, John L. Qawwali achieved a recent wave of popularity in film music, where it forms one of the key components of Hindi films.
Without a live audience, these pre-recorded qawwali soundtracks have a more muted and detached character, with virtuosity pumped up and devotionalism played down.
Secular qawwali is often seen by its true exponents as being commercial and shallow. The rich, sensual and spiritual words are often twisted in the context of more earthly romantic cinema.
Qawwali concerts are a musical gathering, containing a lead singer, second singer, harmonium and tabla and a small choir of other singers all sitting on the floor. During the journey the birds realise they do not need a leader as they contain within themselves the inherent powers which the leader showed. The collective experience of Sufism and qawwali is like this, but one can only truly understand the power of qawwali if one experiences the holiness and spirituality of the form.
Qawwali players must be extremely talented musicians and poets, able to adapt to different moods of ceremonies and able to improvise in several languages in different poetic traditions.
Praise of saints and martyrs of Sufism as well as direct address to the Prophet are common themes in the qawwali. During the concert, one singer will recite poetry, hand gestures and religious phrases and the second singer will create improvised call and response variations.
The main singer then commands the chorus to sing a hypnotic refrain. The variation, improvisation and repetition are carried out to such an extent that the music become hypnotic and meditive, rather like the whirling of the dervishes, leading to a trance-like state. Similarities are seen here with many kind of communal music and shamanistic traditions, from voodoo to African drumming to House and Techno and the minimalist music of composers like Steve Reich.
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