Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan (Urdu/Punjabi: نصرت فتح علی خان; 13 October 1948 – 16 August 1997) was a Pakistani vocalist, primarily a singer of Qawalli, the devotional music of the Sufis. Widely considered one of the greatest voices ever recorded, he possessed an extraordinary range of vocal abilities and could perform at a high level of intensity for several hours. Extending the 600-year old Qawwali tradition of his family, Khan is widely credited with introducing Qawwali music to international audiences. He is popularly known as “Shahenshah-e-Qawwali”, meaning “The Emperor of Qawwali”.
Born in Faisalabad, Khan had his first public performance at the age of 16, at his father’s chelum. He became the head of the family qawwali party in 1971. He was signed by Oriental Star Agencies, Birmingham, England in the early 1980s. Khan went on to release movie scores and albums in Europe, India, Japan, Pakistan and the U.S. He engaged in collaborations and experiments with Western artists, becoming a well-known world music artist. He toured extensively, performing in over 40 countries.
Early life and profession
Khan was conceived in a Punjabi Muslim family in Faisalabad, Punjab, Pakistan, in 1948, soon after the parcel of India in 1947 amid which his family had relocated to Pakistan from their local city of Jalandhar in Punjab, British India (now in Punjab, India). His family begins from Basti Sheik in Jalandhar. His predecessors learned music and singing there and embraced it as a profession. He was the fifth tyke and first child of Fateh Ali Khan, a musicologist, vocalist, instrumentalist, and qawwal. Khan’s family, which included four more established sisters and a more youthful sibling, Farrukh Fateh Ali Khan, experienced childhood in focal Faisalabad. The custom of qawwali in the family had gone down through progressive ages for just about 600 years. Initially, his dad did not need Khan to pursue the family’s occupation. He had his heart set on Nusrat picking a significantly more decent profession way and turning into a specialist or designer since he felt Qawwali craftsmen had low economic wellbeing. In any case, Khan indicated such a bent for and enthusiasm for Qawwali, that his dad at long last relented. He started by taking in the tabla before proceeding onward to vocals. In 1964, Khan’s dad kicked the bucket, leaving his melodic training under the supervision of his fatherly uncles, Mubarak Ali Khan and Salamat Ali Khan. He is the uncle of artist Rahat Fateh Ali Khan. Nusrat was known as Pervaiz until the point when he visited Ghulam Ghaus Samdani who changed his name to Nusrat Fateh Ali. Samdani additionally disclosed to him that he would turn into an extraordinary artist.
In 1971, after the passing of his uncle Mubarak Ali Khan, Khan turned into the official pioneer of the family Qawwali party and the gathering wound up known as Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, Mujahid Mubarak Ali Khan and Party. Khan’s first open execution as the pioneer of the Qawwali party was at a studio recording communicated as a major aspect of a yearly music celebration sorted out by Radio Pakistan, known as Jashn-e-Baharan. Khan sang for the most part in Urdu and Punjabi and infrequently in Persian, Braj Bhasha and Hindi. His first real hit in Pakistan was the tune Haq Ali, which was performed in a customary style and with conventional instrumentation. The melody included controlled utilization of Khan’s sargam improvisations.
Later profession
In the mid year of 1985, Khan performed at the World of Music, Arts and Dance (WOMAD) celebration in London. He performed in Paris in 1985 and 1988. He initially visited Japan in 1987, at the welcome of the Japan Foundation. He performed at the fifth Asian Traditional Performing Art Festival in Japan. He additionally performed at Brooklyn Academy of Music, New York in 1989, acquiring him reverence from the American audience.
Khan, all through his vocation, had extraordinary comprehension with numerous south Asian artists, for example, Alam Lohar, the Noor Jehan, and different other Pakistani and Indian artists.
In the 1992 to 1993 scholastic year, Khan was a Visiting Artist in the Ethnomusicology office at the University of Washington, Seattle, Washington, United States.
In 1988, Khan collaborated with Peter Gabriel on the soundtrack to The Last Temptation of Christ, which prompted Khan being marked to Gabriel’s Real World name. He would proceed to discharge five collections of customary Qawwali through Real World, alongside the more test collections Mustt (1990), Night Song (1996), and the after death remix collection Star Rise (1997).
Khan’s exploratory work for Real World, which highlighted his joint efforts with the Canadian guitarist Michael Brook, prodded on a few further coordinated efforts with various other Western writers and shake artists. A standout amongst the most essential of these joint efforts came in 1995, when Khan assembled with Pearl Jam’s lead vocalist Eddie Vedder on two melodies for the soundtrack to Dead Man Walking. Khan likewise given vocals to The Prayer Cycle, which was assembled by Jonathan Elias, however kicked the bucket before the tracks could be finished. Alanis Morissette was acquired to sing with his incomplete vocals. In 2002, Gabriel incorporated Khan’s vocals on the after death discharged track “Flag to Noise” on his collection Up.
Khan’s collection Intoxicated Spirit was assigned for a Grammy Award for Best Traditional Folk Album in 1997. That equivalent year, his collection Night Song was likewise designated for a Grammy Award for Best World Music Album.
Khan contributed melodies to, and performed in, a few Pakistani movies. In the blink of an eye before his passing, he created music for three Bollywood films, which incorporates the film Aur Pyaar Ho Gaya, in which he likewise sang for “Koi Jaane Koi Na Jaane” on-screen with the lead combine, and “Zindagi Jhoom Kar”; He additionally formed music for Kartoos, where he sang for “Ishq Da Rutba”, and “Bahaa Na Aansoo”, close by Udit Narayan. He kicked the bucket in the blink of an eye preceding the film’s discharge. His last music sythesis for Bollywood was for the motion picture, Kachche Dhaage, where he sang in “Iss Shaan-E-Karam Ka Kya Kehna”. The motion picture was discharged in 1999, two years after his passing. The two singing sisters of Bollywood, Asha Bhosle and Lata Mangeshkar sang for the tunes he created in his concise stretch in Bollywood. He sang “Saya Bhi Saath Jab Chhod Jaye” for Sunny Deol’s motion picture Dillagi. The tune was discharged in 1999, two years after Khan’s passing. He likewise sang “Dulhe Ka Sehra” from the Bollywood motion picture Dhadkan which was discharged in 2000.
Khan contributed the melody “Masters of Peace” to the collection Vande Mataram, formed by A. R. Rahman, and discharged to commend the 50th commemoration of India’s freedom. As an after death tribute, Rahman later discharged a collection titled Gurus of Peace, which notwithstanding “Allah Hoo” by Khan. Rahman’s 2007 tune “Tere Bina” was additionally made as a tribute to Khan.
Death
Different reports said Khan weighed more than 300 pounds. He had been truly sick for a while, as indicated by a representative at his U.S. name, American Recordings. After making a trip to London from his local Pakistan for treatment for liver and kidney issues, he was surged from the airplane terminal to Cromwell Hospital in London.
He kicked the bucket of a sudden heart failure at Cromwell Hospital on 16 August 1997, matured 48. His body was repatriated to Faisalabad, and his memorial service was an open issue. He was covered in Kabootran Wala Qabristan otherwise called Jhang Road Graveyard on Jhang Road, Faisalabad.
His better half, Naheed Nusrat, passed on 13 September 2013 in Credit Valley Hospital in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada. Naheed had moved to Canada after the passing of her significant other. She is made due by their girl Nida Khan. Khan’s melodic inheritance is presently conveyed forward by his nephews, Rahat Fateh Ali Khan and Rizwan-Muazzam.
Grants and titles
Khan is generally viewed as the most imperative qawwal in history. In 1987, he got the President of Pakistan’s Award for Pride of Performance for his commitment to Pakistani music. In 1995, he got the UNESCO Music Prize. In 1996 he was granted Grand Prix des Amériques at Montreal World Film Festival for extraordinary commitment to the craft of cinema. around the same time, Khan got the Arts and Culture Prize of the Fukuoka Asian Culture Prizes. In Japan, he was likewise recognized as the Budai or “Singing Buddha”. In 2005, Khan got the “Legends” grant at the UK Asian Music Awards. Time magazine’s issue of 6 November 2006, “60 Years of Asian Heroes”, records him as one of the best 12 specialists and scholars in the last 60 years. He additionally showed up on NPR’s 50 incredible voices list in 2010. In August 2010 he was incorporated into CNN’s rundown of the twenty most notorious artists from the previous fifty years. In 2008, Khan was recorded in fourteenth position in UGO’s rundown of the best artists of all time.
Numerous privileged titles were presented to Khan amid his 25-year music profession. He was given the title of Ustad (the ace) in the wake of performing established music at a capacity in Lahore on the commemoration of his dad’s death.
