#mekaal hasan

[mountvision]

Lead singer of the Mekaal Hasan Band drawn in Joe’s Pub NYC

Charcoal on 14 x 17 inch paper 2016

[oozii31]

Yaar e Mann Baya (Come here my beloved) Balabam Raseeda Janam (My life is on my lips) Tu biya ke zinda manam: (Come here and make me alive)

Amir Khusro - Yaar e Mann Baya (Persian) 

Raag Darbari - Composed by Mekaal Hasan Band - A Beautiful Composition

[eclecticeuphony]

Sampooran (2004) - Mekaal Hasan Band

It's a shame how less known this band is in India.

I was reading about Javed Bashir after having watched Coke Studio Season 2, and got to know that he is the lead vocalist for a fusion band called "Mekaal Hasan Band". The band describes themselves as a "Sufi-Rock" band, which is just the least to say about them. The frontman of the band is Mekaal Hasan has learnt from Berklee College of music, Boston and is a maestro at the instrument. He also produces for not only his band, but also other famous musicians around Pakistan. He has worked for film soundtracks as well. To bring a classical flavour to the tracks, we have Mohammad Papu on various flutes, whose sound is seldom heard in the songs through an electronic filter (which is so ahead of it's time and is awesome).

The band has 2 albums, "Sampooran", released in 2004 and "Saptak" - released in 2009 (even Wikipedia is confused about when it has released).

These guys are serious musicians! There is wisdom of Baba Bulleh Shah in their lyrics, the intricacies and variations of western harmonies, the heft of electric guitar, years and years of classical training and practice by the hindustani musicians. This makes the songs very serious outputs.

This band started off as an instrumental-focussed band, and these experiments can be seen through tracks like Andholan from Saptak, Sampooran and Late Moon from Sampooran; but later turned into a vocal and classical melody driven band.

The best part of all the songs in this album is Hindustani Classical arrangement of intense and depp Punjabi/Urdu lyrics, paired with complementing western guitars and jazz-like fluid, improvisation-based percussion. This kind of percussion goes hand in hand with Hindustani Classical, because of the improvising-oriented nature of Hindustani Classical music.

The songs that are not lyrically based on Sufi kalaams are based on Bandishes and Khyals from Hindustani Classical music.

The opening number "Sajan", "Waris Shah" and "Rabba" are mellow and easy, a quality that is not seen in many of Mekaal Hassan's tracks. Especially, the second album "Saptak" tends to be not only far more quick and upbeat, but also intense and heavy melodically, and harmonically.

Hats off to the title track, "Sampooran" which is a guitar-flute jugalbandi of sorts based around Raag Yaman. This song is also quite grave in it's mood, though it is Raag Yaman. A small section of this song aptly utilizes Javed Bashir's aalaps around a famous Hindustani Classical Bandish. What vocal quality! There seems to be wisdom of a thousand years in Javed Bashir's vocals - both lyrically and melodically. Mekaal Hassan, on his electric guitar also follows the Raag Yaman scale while playing in a blues-rock style. Which is downright awesome, and might even sound better than the flute parts at times.

"Sanwal" was probably the biggest hit of Mekaal Hassan Band that brought it to popular notice (to those who know the band). "Sanwal", "Darbari" and "Ya Ali" are heavy and gravely. The flute, guitars and vocals in all the three songs are so intense, none of them tend to tone down for the other - but that's what you want to listen to when you listen to Mekaal Hassan Band! That's the style that defines the band. "Sanwal" and "Ya Ali" have sufi lyrics, while "Darbari" lyrically belongs to a more western / central part of Asia, and not Pakistan or India as such; while is melodically around Raag Darbari Kanada.

All in all, this album is an amazing introduction to a band that is so sharp in terms of it's melodies. It is intense, serious, and even aggressive at parts (the climax of Darbari and Ya Ali's progressive composition).

Do give it a listen. Mekaal Hassan Band have done this in 2004. That is unbelievable! They were years ahead of their time. It is only after 2009, after the popular Coke Studio, and festivals like NH7, that people started enjoying indie music of this sort.

The bad part about this band is that they have disbanded quite a lot, especially since 2010. It's quite the heartbreak considering the mature melodies that they came up with and the standards they have set in just 2 albums. Javed Bashir left, came back, and left again. Asad Abbas was the vocalist for a while, and now they are an Indo-Pak music act, featuring an Indian female vocalist.

http://www.mekaalhasanband.com/

[hindi-cinema-blog]

KAHAANI Music Review: Kolkata, You Sexy!

  In recent days, the only full recent soundtrack running on my computer is Vishal-Shekhar's powerful and quirky Kahaani, with which I have been very pleasantly surprised, feeling that the duo have just delivered one of their best soundtracks to date, expanding their scope of musical expression and delighting us with a titillating new sound.

Bengali, English and Hindi greet the listener with Aami Shotti Bolchi, in which cold-jazz transforms into metal rock and back, hitting a home run with Usha Uthup's and Shekhar Ravjiani's oodles and bundles of attitude. People hailing from Kolkata have a new and ferociously catchy urban song to impress with!  The track has been paired to a promotional video that is currently making my cinematic "mouth" water.

Hard rock only calms down for a few seconds before joining a Bengali musical background and the great qawaali singer and Mekaal Hasan Band lead vocalist, Javed Bashir, in a fierce 'alaap' that conveys the tone of the story's turmoil. Piya Tu Kaahe Rootha Re boasts highly effective lyrics written by Sandeep Shrivastava and we also cannot congratulate the duo of musical directors enough for their excellent choice of vocalist in this particular song. Several of my preferred Vishal and Shekhar hits are romantic ballads. Their soft melodies are usually extremely well crafted and Kahaani, the film's title song, follows in such a tradition, taking the best of Vishal-Shekhar's melodic romantic style and gifting it to the extremely well-cast voices of KK in its male version and Shreya Ghoshal in its female and acoustic counterpart. Shreya's voice here is just the way I fancy it the most. I believe minimalistic musical arrangements truly showcase her talent and the song's chorus deftly pulls the listener into Vidya's (the film's lead) disarray and sensibility with its combination of melancholy inducing chords.

Vidya Balan attends the audio launch of Kahaani

Sukhwinder Singh mixes powerful and mellow vocals in Tore Bina, which starts as a fresh folk song and ultimately slides towards gentle pop. The track is easy to listen to and has vast potential but tends to run in too many style and instrumental directions, which is saddening given its sound melodic base and Singh's compelling vocals. It would have possibly been more effective to keep the arrangements simpler in order to bring out Singh's rendition of the song's lyrics. This said, the track still manages to please.

Vishal Dadlani and Shekhan Ravjiani

The Vishal-Shekhar duo keep a pleasant surprise up their sleeve as their closing track, Ekla Cholo Re, featuring an English chorus sung by Clinton Cerejo, welcoming the sincere and moving voice of Amitabh Bachchan and the words of one of my all-time favorite writers, Bengali legend: Rabindranath Tagore. I would have personally preferred a traditional Bengali background melody but I imagine that the uplifting pop feel has been chosen aiming to be in line with the picturization of Tagore's ode (translation in English here - thank you Dunkdaft and Wikipedia).

Cracking the shell of the stereotype they had been cornered into, Vishal and Shekhar showcase their inventiveness and versatility outside of commercial cinema in this album, which we predict will survive well after the film has received its reviews and accolades. A set of six songs could have limited itself to appear pure and sober. However, the experimental verve the musical pair is displaying has resulted in an exhilarating new sound. Thumbs up!

Our favorite picks: Aami Shotti Bolchi, Piya tu Kaahe Rootha Re and both versions of the Kahaani title song.

Purchase the Kahaani soundtrack Follow Kahaani on Facebook Watch Vidya Balan and Vishal-Shekhar at the Kahaani music launch KAHAANI Singers: Usha Uthup, Javed Bashir, Sukhwinder Singh, Clinton Cerejo, Amitabh Bachchan, Krishnakumar Kunnath (KK), Shreya Ghoshal, Vishal Dadlani, Shekhar Ravjiani Music Directors: Vishal-Shekhar Music Label: T-Series Movie Release Date: March 9, 2012

[pakistani]

Here is the complete and final score of The Taming of the Shrew, which saw 8 sold out performances across Britain, and was a stunning success at The Globe where we made Pakistan proud by being the ONLY country to NOT have a National Theatre Company and yet still put on such a brilliant performance, one which saw us garner rave reviews across the UK media. 

The sequence of the music runs as it does according to the play's twists and turns and we urge you to listen to the entire score in one go so you can truly appreciate the beauty and depth of the music.  We loved performing and playing the music and want to thank all of you along with our amazing actors and the people who made this play possible. Thank you all for your tremendous support!  Musicians: Mohd Ahsan Papu: Flute  Amir Azhar: Steel String Acoustic Guitar, Rhabab, Mandolin  Babar Khanna: Dholak and Doru  Zohaib Hassan: Sarangi  Rakae Jamil: Sitar  Mekaal Hasan: Nylon String Acoustic Guitar

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