Umra Langiyaan

"Music is enough for a lifetime, but a lifetime is not enough for music”

-  Sergei Rachmaninov

I have to say that my becoming and admitting to being a diehard Shafqat Amanat Ali fan is a pretty recent happening. I have admired his voice and work in since his debut album Sagar as a part of the Fuzon band and I welcomed his entry into Bollywood with the very endearing Mitwa, like any other music lover, but it’s only recently that I realized what a beautiful body of work he has managed to do in the past few years both in Bollywood and outside it.

What is it that makes Shafqat's voice and work so special for me? And before I put forward my reasons I would like to add the disclaimer that I am no expert in critiquing music. I talk like a lay person, an average music lover, who can attribute the ear to music to many a winter evening spent with my granddad- him playing his harmonium and singing his favorite folk songs. He was a good singer and his enthusiasm was infectious. Or could it be my dad? Two walls of his room are lined with his massive collection of music tapes, the titles of which include pretty much all the greats of  the Hindustani classical music. The tapes would be played religiously each morning and evening for hours (I even protested, sometime) and the music still reverberates inside me.

Coming back to the reasons why I think Shafqat‘s voice is special: the number one of course is his rigorous training in classical music. And then there is the spiritual element of his personality which gets reflected in the words that he writes or the music that he composes. And last but not the least is his ability to keep up with times, to experiment, fuse and reinvent his music to make it more in tune with the times- The way he chooses his songs when he sings for the others in Bollywood also reflects that. While the latter two might become topics for later blogs, for this one I want to stick to his background in classical music.

When I searched for his non Bollywood music, I stumbled upon this video. 

It sounded interesting – both the words the music. And then it led me to discover the other star of his family, the much loved Asad Amanat AliKhan, his elder brother who passed away, relatively young in 2007. This was one of his most loved song. A Punjabi song written by Mazhar Tirmazi interspersed with some lines of Ghulam Farid. The YouTube comments and the reactions of the audience say it all. But more than everything it’s the joy on his face while he sings which reflects the passion that this family has for their music.

It is not fair not compare the two renditions as the one by Shafqat is done on request in a live concert, impromptu, with a rock band as an accompaniment, while Asad Amanat Ali performs in a studio mehfil with traditional instruments. The quality of sound and video are also vastly different (Shafqat’s is probably captured on phone)

But the point is that these two stars come from the same family. They were taught and polished by their grandfather, father and uncle who are stalwarts of music. Both the brothers’ singing has the ability to surprise. While Asad’s voice for me is like a playful mountain brook which can make you marvel at its ability to change its course at will, Shafqat’s comes across as a placid lake that makes you wonder what is coming out next from its depths. That’s the power of classical discipline, the might of the musical genes! It gives a singer the authority and the control that sets him apart form an untrained voice.

"Umran Langiyaan", when translated form Punjabi, means “lifetimes have passed”. It definitely takes more than one lifetime for listeners like me to even begin to grasp the might of this music which has transcended through generations in this musical clan…