My Favourites: Qawwalis

This post came about because of a discussion with my father, for whom I was downloading some music. His enthusiasm for the music and films of an earlier generation continues unbridled, and our discussion began with a search for songs from old hindi films. It is interesting to note that while it is easy enough to run songs from the 50s and later to the ground, songs from the earlier decade are few and far between. And so, to get good recordings of Amirbai Karnataki, Zohrabai Ambalewali and their ilk was not a sinecure.

And it set off a thought – I had been neglecting my blog of late, so why not a post about a now-ceased-to-exist (in films) music form? The qawwali was once an integral part of our films, and it was a sad day for music lovers when it ceased being so. In one sense, this post also came about because my father wanted me to download some old qawwalis that he had in cassette form, and I discovered how hard it was to find them.

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