Coke Studio Pakistan: an Ode to Eastern Music with a Western Touch
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ISSN (Online) - 2349-8846 Coke Studio Pakistan: An Ode to Eastern Music with a Western Touch SHAHWAR KIBRIA Shahwar Kibria ([email protected]) is a research scholar at the School of Arts and Aesthetics at the Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. Vol. 55, Issue No. 12, 21 Mar, 2020 Since it was first aired in 2008, Coke Studio Pakistan has emerged as an unprecedented musical movement in South Asia. It has revitalised traditional and Eastern classical music of South Asia by incorporating contemporary Western music instrumentation and new-age production elements. Under the religious nationalism of military dictator Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq, the production and dissemination of creative arts were curtailed in Pakistan between 1977 and 1988. Incidentally, the censure against artistic and creative practice also coincided with the transnational movement of qawwali art form as prominent qawwals began carrying it outside Pakistan. American audiences were first exposed to qawwali in 1978 when Gulam Farid Sabri and Maqbool Ahmed Sabri performed at New York’s iconic Carnegie Hall. The performance was referred to as the “aural equivalent of the dancing dervishes” in the New York Times (Rockwell 1979). However, it was not until Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan’s performance at the popular World of Music, Arts and Dance (WOMAD) festival in 1985 in Colchester, England, following his collaboration with Peter Gabriel, that qawwali became evident in the global music cultures. Khan pioneered the fusion of Eastern vocals and Western instrumentation, and such a coming together of different musical elements was witnessed in several albums he worked for subsequently. Some of them include "Mustt Mustt" in 1990 ISSN (Online) - 2349-8846 and "Night Song" in 1996 with Canadian musician Michael Brook, the music score for the film The Last Temptation of Christ (1988) and a soundtrack album for the film Dead Man Walking (1996) with Peter Gabriel, and a collaborative project with Eddie Vedder of the rock band Pearl Jam. Given the freshness it carried, Khan’s qawwali music also made its way to India and achieved instant popularity. He went on to compose music for several Indian films, including Bandit Queen (1996) and Aur Pyaar Hogaya (1997). Aided by the well-entrenched piracy networks of the time, his qawwali gained instant recognition among music lovers in India. Such was the popularity of his “Dam a Dam Mast Qalandar” Sufi song that it was adapted for Bollywood film Mohra (1994), and inspired the hit song “Tu Cheez Badi Hai Mast Mast.” Over time, Khan’s brand of music has inspired a host of musicians, including Jeff Buckley, Peter Gabriel, A R Rahman, Sheila Chandra, and Alim Qasimov. Continuing on the path laid out by Bulleh Shah, Amir Khusrau, Sultan Bahoo, and other Sufi poets, whose writings strove to challenge hegemonic structures of the day in Pakistan, the emerging globality for Pakistan qawwals of the time can be read as the perpetuation of the tradition of aesthetic dissent. This is succinctly captured by Amit Baruah and R Padmanabhan (1997) as, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan returned the Qawwali to the world. He made it popular again not just in Pakistan and India, the home of the traditional Qawwali, but in the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan and other countries. He performed in over 40 countries and recorded more than 150 albums and sold millions of copies worldwide. As Khan’s experimentation with the qawwali art form began to ease the dialogue between folk/traditional sounds of Eastern and Western musicality, the advent of globalisation proved to be a major shot in the arm for qawwali music. Satellite television, particularly MTV, contributed further to the momentum of the musical renaissance. This new sensibility of sound further percolated down the road in the formation of the first Sufi rock band Junoon in Pakistan in 1990, led by Salman Ahmed and American bassist Brian O'Connell. The band’s single “Sayonee” from the album Azaadi, which was released in 1997, achieved runaway success in South Asia and West Asia, and was also ranked at the top of Channel V and MTV charts for two months straight. The Mekaal Hasan Band, formed in 2000 in Lahore, also played an important role in bringing together Indian and Pakistani musicians, and blending Sufi poetry with pop, rock, soul, and Black Rock Coalition music. It also played a significant role in bringing back traditional and folk musicians to the forefront, who were, thus far, relegated to playing backup. The contribution of Qawwali–Flamencos rendered by qawwal Faiz Ali Faiz in collaboration with Spanish Flamenco artistes Miguel Poveda, Duquende, and Chicuelo is also seminal. The surreal renditions of “Allah Hu” and “Tere Ishq Nachaya” at Fes Festival of World Sacred Music (2005) by Faiz blurred differences that had hitherto existed between two music forms to produce a new composite whole, which still ISSN (Online) - 2349-8846 have a lasting effect on listeners. Faiz hoisted qawwali in a Mediterranean orchestration set- up by combining sharp and high-pitched tones of the qawwali with the lilting and malleable rhythms of the Spanish flamenco or the gypsy rhythms of bouzouq[1] and rubab[2]. The joint efforts of Khan and successive luminaries, including Faiz Ali Faiz became the hallmarks for the global presence of qawwali. It was primarily the international recognition for qawwali that prodded Pakistani musicians to look “inward” for inspiration. The dawning of this realisation was first noticed in the music of Mekaal Hasan Band that intended to sensitise the youth about their rich cultural heritage. The fusion aesthetics of Khan, the rebellious sound of Junoon, the multicultural musicality of Faiz Ali Faiz, activated by the conscience of Mekaal Hasan Band, have become a musical bricolage of sociocultural, spiritual, rebellious, and indigenous sensibilities of Pakistan. The coming together of various sensibilities at the global level has resulted in a distinct, identifiable, and new “sensibility of sound.” It is such musical synthesis that has been carried forward from the days of analogue to digital with the launch of Coke Studio Pakistan in 2008. Resuscitation of Traditional Music Picking up from the rich tradition of qawwali revived by the doyens of the art form, Coke Studio Pakistan has been seeking to foreground indigenous, folk, and spiritual music of South Asia balanced by a Western instrumentation scheme. Coke Studio Pakistan found its first producer in Rohail Hyatt, who previously spearheaded the band Vital Signs. It was the first Urdu pop-rock band of Pakistan and gained immense popularity in the underground performance circuit and university campuses across Pakistan. It emerged as a significant player in the spread of the new wave of rock music during the 1980s and 1990s, by becoming important countercultural signage against the conservative rule of Zia-ul-Haq. During the interim period when Vital Signs disbanded in 1998 and Coke Studio began in 2008, Hyatt had worked for movies and produced singles under his Pyramid Productions. With such experience, Hyatt conceived Coke Studio as follows: The idea behind Coke Studio is not to be cool or Western or imitate. It’s just an experience for me and all others involved to look inwards. It is about who we really are. We can’t deny the fact that the soil we live on was once India. The British were here and many others before them. All of them have left behind something. It’s a melting pot. (Sabeeh 2009) Coke Studio has been an onward movement, emerging out of musical dissent that reimagined traditional forms of music with Western instrumentation. Hyatt’s contribution to the musical synergy has been not only to create a balance among the Eastern, Western, and European (as portrayed in the Season 6 of the show) musical traditions, but also to make traditional, folk, and spiritual music workable in the digital ecosystem and on platforms such ISSN (Online) - 2349-8846 as YouTube, Vimeo, among others. Thus, the Coke Studio experiment has brought to the fore multiple technological and sonic advancements. In the span of 12 seasons between 2008 and 2019, Coke Studio Pakistan produced more than 20 Sufi kalams (Sufi poetry set to music) and at least 11 qawwalis by incorporating elements from the other folk music forms of Pakistan. For instance, “Daanah Pe Daanah,” (season 4, episode 1, 1 May 2011), which features Balochi folk singer Akhtar Chanal Zahri and pop singer Komal Rizvi, incorporates “Dam a Dam Mast Qalandar,” where the calls of cattle herders are juxtaposed with a Sufi manqabat (qawwali composed in the honour of Hazrat Imam Ali and/or a Sufi saint). The electronic visuals—a tizzy of red, green, and blue dancing streaks—complement the exuberant and infectious raqs (dance or bodily movement in response to ecstatic music) of the Balochi folk artistes to the hypnotic refrains of "Haq," "Dam Mast," "Ali Dam Haq." The crescendo is finished with reggae tunes on shiny electric guitars that echo the celebratory dance of the folk performers. The kalams and the qawwalis have been performed both by traditional performers or “Nisbati qawwals” and popular artistes. During the 12 seasons, Coke Studio Pakistan provided a platform to the joint performances of qawwals like Ustad Fareed Ayaz and Abu Muhammad, Abida Parveen, Rahat Fateh Ali Khan, and Amjad Sabri; popular artistes like Atif Aslam, Ali Zafar, Ali Sethi, and Quratulain Baloch; folk musicians like Saieen Zahoor and Akhtar Chanal Zahri; to Himri songs of Chakwali musicians; and to Baul Geet in Bengali, Sindhi, Siraiki, Urdu, and Punjabi songs. On the other hand, Coke Studio Explorer, ideated as a prequel to the season 11, and aired in 2018, moved out of the studio set up to ethnographically map the music of Pakistani indigenous communities in their hometowns and villages.