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IN the days after the appalling murder of qawwal Amjad Sabri, I obsessively read any and every piece of commentary I came across about him, his music, and his family’s stature in, and contribution to, their field.
But in Pakistan and in this world, the news cycle turns fast and the paroxysms of outrage and grief over one event are soon pushed aside as others crowd to take their turn. Yet one headline referring to Sabri refuses to budge from my mind, pronouncing as it did that June 22 (when he was killed) was ‘the day the music died’.
It was not an entirely inappropriate turn of expression in this context; originally, the line refers to the death in February 1959 of rock and roll legend Buddy Holly, and rising stars Ritchie Valens and J.P. Richardson, along with their pilot Roger Peterson, in a plane crash in the US. More than half a century later, the world of music still mourns and has not forgotten what these men achieved in their brief lifetimes. And it was one of their own, singer-songwriter Don McLean, who immortalised the phrase in his 1971 song American Pie.
Personal or even state-sponsored generosity to artists is piecemeal.
The brutality that was unleashed on Sabri marks perhaps a horrifying new low, even in a country so drenched in blood. Still, the unprecedented tragedy of the death of an artist in a hail of bullets is one thing; but for the headline to be entirely appropriate, Pakistan would have to be able to claim that in every other way and through several interventions, it is doing whatever is possible to keep the songs being sung out loud. And this, unfortunately, is very far from being the case.
Consider, first, what I think of as the sins of commission, or the wilful acts undertaken by the state that result in damage being done to music and other performing arts industries. The most obvious, and certainly the saddest, is the number of aging musicians, singers, actors, etc who, despite being household names in many cases, receive little to no institutional support when they are infirm or no longer able to earn.
Pakistan celebrates these people, in some cases recognising their hard work through offering well-deserved honours. But there is no state-run organisation to which some such person in need, or his or her family, can apply for the sort of help that adulation alone cannot provide. Occasionally, a news story will surface of how some star of yesteryear needs, for example, medical aid. And sometimes this even prompts someone amongst the great and the good to intervene — though with the cameras always rolling for maximum political mileage.
But such acts of personal or even state-sponsored generosity are piecemeal and fickle, nothing more than the monarch in his carriage tossing a crust of bread to the starving beggar. For Pakistan to really show some loyalty towards those to whom it owes its good times, institutional support is a necessity, and then too when it is available as a right, not a favour. To look at a different aspect of the same issue, there is no public-sector performing artist-funding avenue to which a person can apply for a grant which allows them to pursue their interest in some part of the field. Such interventions are common in other parts of the world that take their cultural heritage more seriously, including across the border to the east.
If these are the sins of commission, consider the other areas where the state of Pakistan, through its inaction, has let die what was once a promising industry. There aren’t any public concerts anymore, have you noticed? Not for years. When such events take place, like much else they are in tightly controlled private venues because of the ubiquitous security concerns of modern-day Pakistan.
Not so long ago, Lahore used to host the annual World Sufi Music Festival (along with the World Theatre Festival), organised by the Rafi Peer Theatre Workshop, at the public venue of the Alhamra Cultural Complex at the Gaddafi Stadium. But not since a firecracker incident, after which the city administration quietly declined to be responsible for security.
The issues are myriad, and far too many to record here. But an important one is that Pakistan’s inability to enforce copyrights, and issues over the release, distribution and rights of music production work, means that many artists are pushed across the border seeking contracts in more equitable landscapes. This, coupled with the fan base that they can exploit in other climes, leaves Pakistan greatly the poorer.
This pattern is unfortunately repeated across many of the art fields, perhaps excluding the fine arts where there is thankfully a greater amount of institutional support. Will the country’s grief over the silencing of a magnificent voice lead to greater soul-searching? It would probably be wise to not hold one’s breath.
The writer is a member of staff.
Published in Dawn, July 4th, 2016
