Their Love For God

By James Poulter, *WOMAD Review: Rizwan-Muazzam Qawwali * - The Epoch Times - USA
Tuesday, July 27, 2010

Rizwan-Muazzam Qawwali is a performance quite unlike any other. Two devotional singers, two harmonium players, and a simply exceptional tabla player accompanied by five handclapping backing singers, create a wall of sound that mesmerises and enraptures.

The rhythms are magnificent, multi-layered, rich and varied. The harmony is flawless, with the two principal singers leading the call and response.

The lead vocalists come from a direct family line of Qawwali musicians which spans over five centuries, and the tradition of Qawwali music itself dates back 1000 years.

Qawwali is the devotional music of the Sufi mystics of Islam, which initially spread from the Gulf States to the Indian sub-continent, and is now enjoyed all over the world.

Brothers Rizwan and Muazzam, the devotional singers, are the nephews of Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, generally considered to be the greatest Qawwali singer of them all. The brothers consider themselves torchbearers of this heritage, and take their responsibilities very seriously.

Despite performing sitting on the ground, the traditional Qawwali style, the energy created by the music is immense, and many of the crowd at the BBC Radio 3 stage were clapping their hands and swaying, with some dancing.

The singers at times entered an almost trance like state, and their hand movements and gestures were expressive and fluid. At times tears were shed as they attempted to convey their love for God.

Each song was epic, changing rhythms and styles many times, threatening to end and then continuing, ebbing and flowing from periods of quiet devotion to intense vibrancy, and by the end even the audience members that remained seated were exhausted.

Transcending narrow cultural, linguistic and religious barriers, a crowd of various ages, backgrounds and races enjoyed the traditional renditions, performed in Urdu, Punjab, and the Persian language Parsi.

Rizwan-Muazzam Qawwali are firm favourites at WOMAD [World of Music, Art and Dance], and it was their performance here as teenagers in the late 1990s that brought them to international prominence.

Picture: Rizwan-Muazzam Qawwali at WOMAD. Photo: Pete Hodge/TET