About a big band and a big crowd at the Apple

THE NEWS
AUGUST 30, 1998

Andy McCord goes Masst, Masst at a recent Pakistan Day festival in New York

Pakistani qawwali and kafi singing -- in old and new forms -- drew a crowd of about 10,000 people here for a Sunday afternoon concert in Central Park.

Ironically, though, the headlining act, Junoon, has been attacked in Pakistan for performing in India just after the nuclear tests last May, however, the event had the character of a patriotic celebration, coming so close to August 14 and with the majority of the crowd being Pakistani or Pakistani-American.

Families turned out dressed in elaborate shalwar kameezes, with their children in frocks or fancy suits, to give those in the audience of other American backgrounds a taste of what a subcontinental mela is like. Obligingly, the sun shown brightly and the temperature rose to 86 degrees Fahrenheit, which is considered hot here.

"It was the largest crowd we've had, " said a beefy security guard at the park's Summerstage, where a popular weekly series of free concerts is held every year.  "But it was a very nice crowd.

Pakistani flags were waved and there were occasional shouts of "Pakistan Zindabad" during the performances by Badar Ali Khan, Abida Parveen and the rock band Junoon. The concert was a tribute to the late qawaal Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and was preceded by a symposium on the cultural and religious significance of his music. The two singers and Junoon each gave separate renditions of Nusrat's signature number, "Mast Qalandhar, " which repeatedly brought the audience to its feet and drew cries of "Ya Ali" from enthusiasts pressing toward the stage in the front row.

The press of the crowd proved daunting to some non-Pakistanis, and many retreated to the edges of the gathering, or outside the enclosed concert area to sit under trees and listen. "It was just to much for me that crowd." said Norbet, a young German who is studying acupuncture in New York.

But the event drew knowledgeable international listeners who have been following the music since their first exposure to Nusrat's songs in soundtracks to several popular movies, beginning with Martin Scorcese's The Last Temptation of Christ.'

"I listen to Nusrat a lot," said Andrew Fenwick, a young Protestant American from New Jersey.  "I really like his music and I liked Badar today." He seemed a little nonplused by Junoon's attempts to merge the qawwali kaiftyat with the driving chords of Anglo-American rock.  "I admire what they're doing, but I liked Badar better," Fenwick said.

For the Pakistanis, though, and some ]Indian Americans, Junoon seemed to be the biggest attraction.  Khalik Sheikh, a medical social worker who lives in Astoria, Queens, came with his sister and two young hejab-wearing nieces. He said he had wanted especially to hear Abida Parveen, but one of his nieces volunteered, "For him she is number one," but for us Junoon is number one."

Junoon's lead guitarist Salman Ahmed made some references from the stage to his band's recent, perhaps accidental, associations with the anti-nuclear cause, but his fans seemed unconcerned with the controversy.  Siddiqui Muhammad, an engineer originally from Krishen Nagar, Lahore who drove across the U.S. from Oklahoma City to be at the concert, said "It's not anti-Pakistan to go to India. They just go there to entertain people. That's their business."

Sheikh also said, "They are artists, they can go anywhere."

On the mingling of traditional religious music with Western rock, Muhammad said, "That is a good aspect, I would say, that can be beneficial for the rock music as well. There is a correlation between the two musics." For Junoon, the event involved an additional homecoming, because Ahmed and his American bass player Brian O'Connell went to school together in New York in the late 1970s.  It was here that Ahmed was exposed to the rock guitarist as culture hero, at a concert by Led Zeppelin at Madison Square Garden.

Though Junoon has already performed in New York, the concert that Sunday was by far its most high profile appearance and attracted favorable notice in the New York Times and other papers.  Before launching into its encore number, the patriotic anthem Jazba-e- Junoon, Ahmed shouted in English, "I want to say hello to everybody here from Tappan Zee High (school)."

With this and other concerts, Pakistani qawwali music has become an increasingly familiar element of the international range of music that since the days of the messianic reggae singer Bob Marley developed a loyal following in the US. The singers on Sunday were given brief explanatory introductions by Robert Browning, head of the World Music Institute, an arts organization that has played a leading role in presenting international music in the US.

The Sabri brothers have sung here peridically at concerts sponsored by Browning's Institute. Last spring, the Faisalabad qawwaals Mehr Ali and Shehr Ali performed at the Asia Society, a tony cultural organization on Park Avenue that is funded by the Rockefeller family. Badar Ali Khan was to perform on August 14 at a popular medium-sized venue here called Tramps. Junoon has a date scheduled at Los Angeles's House of the Blues, which should give it exposure to important entertainment figures.  Abida Parveen was giving a private concert.

Whether or not any of these acts will attain the extraordinary cross-cultural following that Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan did is still an open question. But clearly, the great qawwaal has laid a strong foundation and Pakistan's unique sounds of people's ecstacy and love of God will never again be totally foreign to American ears.

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