Dust to Gold [Slimline]

Performer: Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan
Producer: Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan...
Distributor: Ryko Distribution

Notes: Personnel: Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan (vocals); Farrukh Fateh Ali Khan, Irshad Ali (vocals, harmonium); Rahat Ali Khan (vocals); Dildar Hussain (tabla); Asad Ali, Ilyas Hussain, Naseef Ahmed, Khaled Mehmood (background vocals). Recorded at Sargam Studio, Lahore, Pakistan in June 1997. Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan: Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan (vocals); Farrukh Fateh Ali Khan (vocals, harmonium); Naseef Ahmed, Llyas Hussain, Khaled Memood, Asad Ali, Rahat Fateh Ali Khan (vocals); Dildar Hussain (tabla). If you've ever been to a religious prayer meeting of any denomination, you'll be familiar with the emotional content of this collection of archive recordings of the master Pakistani qawwal Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan. Devotional, inspirational, at times ecstatic, these songs echo the soulful call and response of Gospel music, the timelessness of ancient Hebrew hymns, and the grittiness of traditional folk music. Nusrat's tempered, mystical wail predominates, but the shifting rhythms and the complex melodies of the qawwali party (and it certainly sounds like a party) are what drive these energetic pieces along. As with all the best religious gatherings the overall effect is, of course, hypnotic; there is ultimately no choice but to surrender to the all-enveloping chants, and, like the participants in these compelling recordings, be carried along on the euphoric sonic wave of these songs of devotion to the ineffable.

Q (8/00, p.119) - 3 stars out of 5 - "...Provides a dizzying example of Khan at his best..." CMJ (6/19/00, p.24) - "...A collection that encompasses every ounce of guttural spiritualism and bottomless polyrhythmic hypnotics of his most astounding traditional Qawwali works." JazzTimes (10/00, p.75) - "...Illustrates nicely the carefully balanced degrees of improvisational abandon and control in Khan's vocals, complemented beautifully by his wrap-around ensemble..." Mojo (Publisher) (7/00, p.116) - "...Nusrat doesn't hold back, whipping his band into an impassioned tsunami offering tribute to the Sufi saints and Mohammed. Greatest voice of all time, agreed? It's blistering stuff..."

Pakistan-born Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, the most revered and prolific Qawwali singer in recording history, took an obscure religious musical form and, with the help of some sympathetic collaborators and promoters, made it commercially and artistically viable in the western world. Born to a family of Muslim devotional musicians, Khan succeeded his father as the leader of their family's singing group (or "party") in 1971. Up through the '80s he stuck to the traditional style of Qawwali singing, bringing his passionate and transcendent music to ever-increasing international audiences--religious and secular alike. By the '90s he began experimenting with pop-music hybrids, garnering the attention of influential fans like Eddie Vedder and Peter Gabriel. In 1997, at the height of his commercial success, Khan died of a heart attack at the age of 48, after a lifetime of health problems.

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