Another Link in the Chain of Light

A vault discovery from Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan at his peak

To pore over the available titles credited to legendary Pakistani singer Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan on streaming services is to confront instant choice-paralysis overwhelm. The singer and bandleader, who died in 1997 at age 48, recorded relentlessly during the last 15 years of his life. Those who revere Khan’s supernatural knack for twisting ordinary syllables into expressions of deep devotion will tell you that virtually all of his titles are worth hearing.

Perusing those little square tiles, the Khan catalog appears as something of a mess. There are records with elaborate cover art and others with generic stock photos dropped into crude graphic design templates – usually (but not always) a signal of piracy. There are compilations devoted to Khan qawwalis from Bollywood films, and live performances, and the rapturous “crossover” records he made with guitarist Michael Brook – Mustt Mustt (1990) and Night Song (1996).

And now, there’s a recently discovered set of four traditional qawwalis (the genre term for songs based on Sufi poetry) that Khan and his group recorded live at Peter Gabriel’s Real World Studio in April 1990. The nuanced, gorgeously detailed Chain of Light stands as the most significant archival find since Khan’s death, but given the sheer volume of music he created, it’s entirely possible that more works are lurking in vaults somewhere.

Khan and his group (known as a “party” in qawwali-speak) were so productive because much of what they documented was improvised, in and of the moment: Starting with a few lines of poetry, the singer would initiate an exploration of sound and phrasing that slowly unfolded and changed with each restatement of the key phrase. Khan would begin with relatively plain melodic long tones, stretching for the climb ahead. As he and his backing singers took turns between declaration and embellishment, he’d add “heat” in the form of rhythmic inflection – landing hard on one word, using his visceral siren of a voice to send shockwaves through others. Chortling. Groaning. Laughing like a Buddha, or, maybe, a Halloween lawn ornament.

This vocal improvisation – a focal point of most Khan recordings -- is a treasure of World Culture, full stop. And a marvel to witness. Throughout Chain of Light (and, for that matter, most of his classic records), Khan is as precise as John Coltrane could be about note choice and intervallic relationship – and at the same time wondrously untethered to any conventional organizational system or grid. He can be all flowing robes and woo-woo looseness, fostering unity through pure smooth tones. And then, just when his listener is lulled, out come the sharp knives, which Khan uses to slice quarter notes into dizzy subdivided triplet constructions and jarring polyrhythms. Each irregularly-shaped idea – many of them shaded and supported by a trailing harmonium – opens new lanes of call and response activity. That leads to other ideas; the very act of ad-libbing becomes an option-riddled path to enlightenment.

Of course I’d recommending taking the whole journey, but for those who require an Executive Summary relating to the above description, find your way to these passages:

On the Urdu song “Ya Gaus Ya Meeran” – which Brook describes in this New York Times story as a deep-track choice for Khan – check the way Khan dances through the descending diatonic sequence that begins around 3:40.

And track 4, “Khabram Raseed Imshab,” contains a minute that illustrates the sensitivity Khan’s musicians brought to the accompaniment role. Shortly after the 7:00 minute mark, Khan veers away from the call and response volleying. This evolves into a crisp interplay around just a few notes – a game of sorts, what jazz people might call a “stop-time” passage.

**

I interviewed Khan for The Philadelphia Inquirer in 1993, during one of his U.S. tours. (This past weekend I turned over everything in my office in hopes of finding the cassette. I sadly had no luck, but was able to track down the published piece, which helped pry the following memory loose.). It was a press day for him, not a performance day, and when I was ushered into a suite at the Gramercy Park Hotel in New York, I encountered not just Khan but several members of his band, his tour manager and a translator. The suite was active – I could hear someone ordering room service in an adjacent room, and musicians wandered in with shopping bags, said hi and just sat down. This was unusual for me; most interviews are conducted one on one, not in a crowd. It didn’t seem to bother Khan at all.

My first question was the most obvious one: I wanted to understand what Khan did to get himself “in the zone,” ready for a performance or recording session. He talked about preparation in lofty terms, as a lifelong thing that’s never completed. And then he turned to the more prosaic, demonstrating the breathing rituals he did before going on stage. He turned his head methodically from side to side, stopping at regular points to discharge a measured amount of air. "By turning in this way," Khan explained, "we are acknowledging the presence of God in all directions. It makes certain types of anxiety more distant."

Khan believed that this technique helped him create the conditions under which his music could thrive. Because his goal wasn’t simply to impress people by singing – he sought to cultivate a trance, a state of ecstasy that traveled throughout the space in ways that would connect he and his collaborators with listeners.

This, he acknowledged, was hard work, requiring focus from the performers, receptivity from listeners, and a welcoming environment. He was specific about that aspect: "I never use the prayer when there is alcohol or smoking in the place we are playing."

I took that to mean: It’s not simply that Khan needed the air clear to execute those harrowing half-step swerves and melismatic flights; he just wanted there to be nothing getting between the idea, its execution, and its intended target. Nothing junking up the transmission. The magical clarity of that is audible throughout Chain of Light.