As Afghanistan reels from the Taliban takeover, it’s the people of the war-torn country that suffer, especially women, with no idea how the future of the country’s going to shape up. In such distressing circumstances next door, two musicians have come together to convey a message of solidarity, love and compassion to the Afghan people through their music.

Zeb Bangash and Canadian-Afghan Shamali Afghan have joined forces to not just revive the traditional Afghan music lost in the Soviet war, but also pay a tribute to the land that has seen destruction in the last few decades. The duo has released covers of four Pashto and Dari songs originally sung by renowned Afghan musicians, and called them ‘Love Letters to Kabul’. While the songs were recorded in December-January, it became all the more relevant to release them now.

“We realised the country faced the same war-like situation and turmoil as it did when the original songs were recorded. We musicians cannot help in any other way than make music dedicated to the people, remind the world of what’s happening in Afghanistan and stand in solidarity with them,” Shamali told Dawn over the phone from Toronto.

After recording the songs earlier this year, the singers flew back to Canada and the US. “I was visiting again for a month so we thought we’d launch the songs post Muharram. But as things started unfolding, the idea of these songs became more charged. We’ve seen displacement of artists (from Afghanistan) decade after decade and it’s distressing because artists are always the ones who are first hit. We had this work, so thought why not just dedicate it to our love for Kabul and its culture,” explained Zeb in a chat with Dawn.

The two had been trying to collaborate for a couple of years, but getting together was logistically challenging. Their first meeting was nothing short of emotional. “It was like meeting a long lost cousin,” as Zeb puts it.

“When I was invited to Coke Studio in 2018, I was introduced to Zeb by Rohail (Hayat) sir. When I spoke to her I realised our families knew each other for over 35 years -- my father,

Ustad Shah Wali, who migrated to Pakistan in 1979 during the Soviet war, used to sing at her grandmother’s house very frequently as she was a huge fan of Pashto and Dari music. Even two of Zeb’s hit songs, ‘Paimona Bideh’ and ‘Bibi Sanam’, were sung by my father at her house that she later covered,” recalled Shamali.

Sharing her first encounter with Shamali, Zeb remembers: “All the songs I’ve sung were brought to my household through Shamali’s father whom my grandmother used to think of as her son. So when I heard his voice in a voice message sent to me by Rohail, I was like ‘I know this is Ustad Shah Wali’s son’.

The duo was supposed to sing for Coke Studio but that didn’t happen and Shamali did a solo song. “Later, Zeb suggested we work together on our own, but we just couldn’t sit down and record. We had almost given up when, interestingly, last winter, I was in Kabul and she in Lahore and I was about to go back to Canada when she asked if I could make it here. After a lot of struggle and visa issues, I came to Lahore. When we finally met, I told Zeb I have these beautiful old classic Pashto and Dari songs that I’ll sing and you choose which sounds good.”

Zeb felt she wanted to reconnect with the pure artistic impulse and remain in touch with the traditions she grew up with through the collaboration, but as things started developing in Afghanistan, it assumed a new relevance.

The duo ended up selecting songs by three of the most popular Afghan singers of the early 1900s: ‘Droond De Amil’ by Nashenas, ‘Yaar’ by Ghulam Dastagir Shaida, and ‘Shirin Goftar’ and ‘Gham’ by Momin Khan Biltoon. The songs were recorded and put together in three weeks by producer Saad Sultan, while the traditional music incorporated in them was especially recorded in Peshawar with traditional musicians.

“Shamali and I were very particular, we didn’t want a big dance track, but very cultural, traditionally rooted tracks that had the essence of our traditional saazina. After recording

the main instruments in Peshawar, Shamali told me about the brilliant string player who plays rabab, baglama, the tabla player Javed Khan and how he kept asking them to play traditional music. They weren’t initially able to get it because their style wasn’t in ‘demand’ today. When they got it, they played with their heart,” Zeb explained why they got musicians from Peshawar on board.

The reason they zeroed in on the four particular songs was family association, memories with the traditional music and attempts to revive it and solidarity with the Afghan people.

“Our families were attached to Ustad Biltoon’s songs back in the day and used to listen to them as children. Ustad Nashenas’ song we chose is based on war whose lyrics say ‘the necklace around our neck is too heavy to carry, I thought the army would be there for a few days but it seems to be building houses in our country’. It was about the invading Soviet army, and we sang it because my father had performed it at Zeb’s house once, so it brought back many memories. We wanted to bring back the same taste and music that was lost because of the war,” shared Shamali.

On why they chose these particular songs and not come up with originals, Zeb said since she was interacting with Shamali for the first time, they thought it was best to learn from the old masters first and then move on to the new and original. “We looked at the mood, scale and beauty of each song. We ended up choosing songs from three different ustads, who resided in Kabul in the 20th century and have very different styles, but are extremely iconic in the musical heritage of the city.”

The Paimona singer believes her musicality matches with that of Shamali and they could continue working together, and maybe invite other Afghan musicians to collaborate. Shamali

is sure he’ll stay in touch with Zeb and maybe do a musical tour if this project is received well.

Published in Dawn, September 12th, 2021

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