Volume 21 Issue 8 - May 2016

Beat by Beat | World View
Abida Parveen
Seasonal Affect;
Musical Uplift
ANDREW TIMAR
To quote the chorus of a 1980s song, Up Where We Belong,“Love
lifts us up where we belong/Where the eagles cry on a mountain
high.” Substitute the word “Spring” for “Love” and I’m singing
along at this season with its onset of new green growth, and with its
promise of renewal. All it takes is the first stretch of warm weather to
melt even this crusty scribe’s professorial attitude. So seasonally activated,
my mind wanders easily far beyond my concrete condo to the
wilds of the mountain high, to the sound of the soaring eagle’s cry –
the song’s haunting metaphor for human love surmounting obstacles.
Though those lyrics seem to evoke a geo-spiritual alpine terrain
far removed from our urban landscape, yet the two-metre wingspans
and the morning cries of the majestic bald eagle are making a
regional Ontario comeback. Along the vast stretches of the northern
shores of the Great Lakes, hundreds of confirmed breeding pairs have
been reported in the past decade. It’s a heartening sign that efforts to
rehabilitate our near-urban local environment appear to be bearing
fruit. Mind you, I don’t feel compelled to personally witness those
high-flying raptors in action; even the thought of their living presence
nearby is enough to make this confirmed urban Torontonian’s
heart soar.
Abida Parveen, “My audience is my God”: This season is full of
human music too. May 15 the voice of Abida Parveen, unequivocally
described by The Guardian as “the greatest female Sufi singer in
history” – an opinion shared by many others by the way – will echo
in the cavernous aerie of Roy Thomson Hall, her voice expressing the
various colours of our species’ yearning for union with the divine.
The Pakistani singer is an acclaimed Sufiana kalaam (Sufi music)
exponent. Her primary mode of expression is through two poetic
song genres, ghazal and kafi (a solo genre accompanied by drums
and harmonium that uses a repertoire of songs by Sufi poets in Urdu,
Sindhi, Saraiki, Punjabi and Persian). Taught by her father, Ustad
Ghulam Haider, and by Ustad Salaamat Ali Khan, she has amassed
legions of fans in her four-decade international career. The Icelandic
diva Björk, a shrewd judge of both extreme vocalism and passion,
counts herself among them.
Co-presented by the Aga Khan Museum and Roy Thomson Hall, this
concert is undoubtedly a special one. RTH’s director of programming
and marketing, Chris Lorway, has dubbed it a “once-in-a-lifetime
opportunity for Toronto.” In his comments prepared for this column,
Lorway emphasized its inter-institutional dimensions. “The chance to
present an international icon like Abida Parveen is a thrill for us, and
we could not have done it without the partnership with Amir and his
team at the Aga Khan.”
Lorway also underscored the importance of reaching out to the
diverse enthic, national and faith-based communities in the city. “As
we strive to make our venues more reflective of the city of Toronto,
these collaborative initiatives are the only way forward. They allow us
to combine our collective audiences of music lovers and the culturally
curious in a way that has long-term benefits for both organizations.”
For his part Amirali Alibhai, head of performing arts at the Aga
Khan Museum, noted that Abida Parveen “has taken the kafi form of
musically rendering the poetry of great mystics to new heights, which
is quite significant for a practice that is traditionally dominated by
men. Performing in several languages, Parveen’s interpretations cross
barriers of understanding through her passionate and possessed vocal
expression.” Making a bold comparative leap across cultural boundaries,
Alibhai aptly observes that “she is to Sufi music what Aretha
Franklin is to soul.”
In addition he makes a well-observed case for the important role
concert venues can play, “to bring such presentations out of less-thanideal
stadium and make-do venues into respectful spaces, bespoken
for art and possessing exceptional acoustics, as is fitting for esteemed
artists such as Abida Parveen.”
A respectful space is what Parveen’s spiritually motivated performance
deserves. “My culture – our culture – is rich in spirituality and
love,” she told The Guardian reporter Nosheen Iqbal in 2013. “Sufism
is not a switch, the music isn’t a show – it’s all of life, it is religion.
If I want to be recognized for anything, if we should be recognized
for anything, it’s the journey of the voice. And that voice is God’s.”
Parveen has been known to enter an altered consciousness while
deep in performance. As The Guardian article observed, “she regularly
sends her audiences in Pakistan and India into swaying raptures,
swooning and fainting being quite standard reactions.”
And her fans admire and adore her as much as they do her fellow
compatriot singers, the late Mehdi Hassan (1927-2012) and Nusrat
Fateh Ali Khan (1948-1997). She freely returns that love. “Poor people,
rich people – we are all God’s servants…I’m lucky. My audience
is my God.”
May 26-June 4
Featuring: Vicky Chow (Bang on a Can All Stars), Tristan Perich,
Sarah Neufeld (Arcade Fire), Katherine Young, Nick Fraser,
Kyle Brenders Big Band, Tenderness, Bernice, Pursuit Grooves,
Bill Coleman & Gordon Monahan, Ame Henderson/Public Recordings,
Chris Willes & Adam Kinner, Nasar-I Turkwaz, Caroline Eyck and PSQ,
Gabriel Dharmoo, Leanne Zacharias, Unbuttoned and more!
YouTube Playlist: bit.ly/oe16play | Info and Tickets:
openears.ca
openearsfest
openearsfest
@openearsfest
#OE16
26 | May 1, 2016 - June 7, 2016 thewholenote.com