Review: Abida Parveen live in Dubai
The Pakistani Sufi singer treats fans to an evening of truth and peace
What is the word you seek when you encounter a glimpse of divinity in the sea of human imperfection?
Haq or truth.
What do the desert sands
reveal when they rise and move mountains? The wind blows bright, the sun
humbles, thirst destroys and bares the core. And from that stripped
down center arises the truth of Sufism.
Abida Parveen is one of the
greatest exponents of this truth in our time. So, a review — this is
not. It would be too presumptuous an attempt.
She sang for an hour and
forty minutes on Friday evening to a crowd of enthusiasts, who drank in
every word of her performance with the thirst of a drought-ridden earth.
The sound quality failed her but she performed with the transcendence of one whose calling is to spread the message of peace.
She opened
with Man Kunto Maula Ali from Amir Khusro’s pen, 700 years on and the
magic of one of India’s greatest poets still reigns. Yaar Ko Hamne Ja
Baja Dekha, which essentially translates to wherever I look I see the
work of God, followed this, and Sindh’s (Pakistan) legendary Sufi
teacher Baba Bulleshah’s Mere Ishq Na Chahiya.
Originally from Sindh, Abida started training at the age of three. She performs in Urdu, Seraiki, Punjabi, Hindi and Sindhi.
The evening ended with Chaap
Tilak, Amir Khusro’s praise to his guide Nizammuddin Auliya followed by
Laal Shahbaz Qalander. The dervishes’ message of unity, equality and
purity of path stays true in Abida.
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