On 14 June, the day marking the anniversary of both birth and death of the Afghan song genius, Ahmad Zahir, reflectors may have been pointed to his grave in Shuhada-ye Salihin, where commemoration and musical events took place. But not too far from there, in Kucha-e Kharabat, the musicians’ quarter in the Old City, another ceremony connected to music was being enacted on the same day, pointing towards a rebirth, or to the refusal to die, of a musical tradition and of the traditions of its musicians. Fabrizio Foschini enjoyed the music, the setting, the company and the food.
Do not think about one of those more often than not boring end of year school concerts where everybody goes mainly for the buffet or under familial pressure, or of one of those formal, spent memorial gatherings were desperate participants cling to the coffee jug when the authorities speak. Forget even the solemnity and the silence usually associated with Western classical music. This is Kharabat, first of all, and its inhabitants can be fully ignored by the government and the rest of the world and still be graciously able to throw a party by themselves (and for themselves) with mirth, good food and, of course, unrivalled music.
The occasion was given by three shagerdan (students) of Ustad Sardar, who having become accomplished rubab players after a years-long and difficult training, were to pass through the gormani ceremony. This, in the words of Ustad Sardar at the beginning of the gathering, is ‘a ceremony which has an ancient and fundamental presence in the canons of the artists of Kharabat; as we all know, a gormani is one of the customs coming from the old days of Kharabat. In the past, when the great masters of Kharabat had gormani ceremonies they would hold a similar concert, with rubab, tabla and singers. Now, as from this alley of Kharabat – nay, from this very house – comes all the skill and the virtuosity I may have, and for this people of Kharabat who still form the majority of my students, I wanted to have the same.’
The chosen venue the Ustad was mentioning was in fact a highly symbolic one. Both as a tribute to the master of Afghan rubab and one of the most significant personality in Afghan music, and because of its convenient location at the heart of Kharabat, the event was held in the house of late Ustad Muhammad Omar (see our previous PashtoMashto here). The courtyard of the humble house, covered with carpets and protected by the sun with a huge tent drape, could barely contain the more than hundred persons that gathered from nine in the morning to late afternoon, but it looked by far the most appropriate setting for the re-enactment of such a ceremony.
The gormani, which features the tying of a second bracelet on the wrists of the students – the first being knotted when they are accepted by the ustad as disciples – signifies the end of their musical training, in common parlance their becoming pokhta, ‘cooked’ or ‘well-done’. This does in no way imply cutting ties with their ustad, with whom they may have been studying and living for years by now, but it marks the beginning of their musical career as professionals(*). ‘They can make use of their rubabs now, and of the science they have acquired’, and also retain whatever earnings they may get. Previously, if they were to participate to a concert, it would be theustad to administer the money thus earned.
The end of this apprenticeship period is marked by a classical musical essay in front of the public – made a tough one by its being formed of ustadan and people who grow literally with music in their ears(**). Also, this can be judged by the choice of the pieces the shagerdan presented: Rag Purya Kalyan, Rag Megh, Rag Purya Dhanashree are not exactly elementary compositions that rubab students get accustomed with early in their training.
As in other public events, even here, of course, lunchtime was one of the highlights of the day, registering a record affluence. The original plan to feed the participants first, and then to give the rest to charity, was not followed with conviction by the guys manning the big cauldrons of rice and kofta in the alley, in a place where almost everybody can claim to be the student or relative of this or that musician. In a short span of time queues of small boys and girls sent from nearby homes armed with kettles were happily tampering the distribution process to get their share. Anyway, if some people ate and left, many more flocked back after lunch to listen to the music of the ustadan, contrary to other venues.
Of these, there were actually quite a bunch. Apart from Ustad Sardar Mado, the main organizer of the event, one could spot several big names: Ustad Rajab Ali, son of Ustad Muhammad Omar; Ustad Alem Jan; Ustad Ra’is son of Ustad Shaida; Ustad Hayatullah Khan; Ustad Sakhi; Ustad Khaled and Ustad Sanam from Jalalabad, outstanding tabla masters; even Ustad Ghulam Sakhi, father of the Humayun Sakhi of international fame was there.
Apart from sanctioning the ceremony with kisses and blessings to the newly ‘graduated’ students – and after that joining Ustad Sardar in unwrapping the gifts brought by the latter – many of the present ustads also jumped on stage to delight the audience with their music (see an excerpt of Ustad Khaled’s Bol ‘singing’ on the tabla here).
And that display of music from and for Kharabat, of course, was one of the major objectives of the day. As Ustad Sardar repeated to the RTA journalist (the state television correspondent being the lone presence, along with me, of the world beyond the alley): ‘In the last decades people have been in a bad situation because of conflict and poverty, that is why they had reduced the gormani ceremony to a shorter version. So we ustadan decided to revive this ancient tradition of Afghanistan and of Kharabat in its full form, and to have a big dangal, a big concert in such an occasion.’
With all this talk of traditional (institutions) and (legal) customs in nowadays Afghanistan it was a nice show indeed to witness the happy re-enactment of an ancient ritual in a wholly Afghan-led process, at least for a day.
(*) In Kharabat, we are of course talking mainly about professional musicians, people who earn their bread with their rubab, their tabla or their voice – although many shawki ‘amateur’ musicians were also present at the ceremony.
(**) Out of metaphor: I could distinctly hear children in the public commenting on the more skilful passages on the tabla or the rubab.
On 14 June, the day marking the anniversary of both birth and death of the Afghan song genius, Ahmad Zahir, reflectors may have been pointed to his grave in Shuhada-ye Salihin, where commemoration and musical events took place. But not too far from there, in Kucha-e Kharabat, the musicians’ quarter in the Old City, another ceremony connected to music was being enacted on the same day, pointing towards a rebirth, or to the refusal to die, of a musical tradition and of the traditions of its musicians. Fabrizio Foschini enjoyed the music, the setting, the company and the food.
Do not think about one of those more often than not boring end of year school concerts where everybody goes mainly for the buffet or under familial pressure, or of one of those formal, spent memorial gatherings were desperate participants cling to the coffee jug when the authorities speak. Forget even the solemnity and the silence usually associated with Western classical music. This is Kharabat, first of all, and its inhabitants can be fully ignored by the government and the rest of the world and still be graciously able to throw a party by themselves (and for themselves) with mirth, good food and, of course, unrivalled music.
The occasion was given by three shagerdan (students) of Ustad Sardar, who having become accomplished rubab players after a years-long and difficult training, were to pass through the gormani ceremony. This, in the words of Ustad Sardar at the beginning of the gathering, is ‘a ceremony which has an ancient and fundamental presence in the canons of the artists of Kharabat; as we all know, a gormani is one of the customs coming from the old days of Kharabat. In the past, when the great masters of Kharabat had gormani ceremonies they would hold a similar concert, with rubab, tabla and singers. Now, as from this alley of Kharabat – nay, from this very house – comes all the skill and the virtuosity I may have, and for this people of Kharabat who still form the majority of my students, I wanted to have the same.’
The chosen venue the Ustad was mentioning was in fact a highly symbolic one. Both as a tribute to the master of Afghan rubab and one of the most significant personality in Afghan music, and because of its convenient location at the heart of Kharabat, the event was held in the house of late Ustad Muhammad Omar (see our previous PashtoMashto here). The courtyard of the humble house, covered with carpets and protected by the sun with a huge tent drape, could barely contain the more than hundred persons that gathered from nine in the morning to late afternoon, but it looked by far the most appropriate setting for the re-enactment of such a ceremony.
The gormani, which features the tying of a second bracelet on the wrists of the students – the first being knotted when they are accepted by the ustad as disciples – signifies the end of their musical training, in common parlance their becoming pokhta, ‘cooked’ or ‘well-done’. This does in no way imply cutting ties with their ustad, with whom they may have been studying and living for years by now, but it marks the beginning of their musical career as professionals(*). ‘They can make use of their rubabs now, and of the science they have acquired’, and also retain whatever earnings they may get. Previously, if they were to participate to a concert, it would be theustad to administer the money thus earned.
The end of this apprenticeship period is marked by a classical musical essay in front of the public – made a tough one by its being formed of ustadan and people who grow literally with music in their ears(**). Also, this can be judged by the choice of the pieces the shagerdan presented: Rag Purya Kalyan, Rag Megh, Rag Purya Dhanashree are not exactly elementary compositions that rubab students get accustomed with early in their training.
As in other public events, even here, of course, lunchtime was one of the highlights of the day, registering a record affluence. The original plan to feed the participants first, and then to give the rest to charity, was not followed with conviction by the guys manning the big cauldrons of rice and kofta in the alley, in a place where almost everybody can claim to be the student or relative of this or that musician. In a short span of time queues of small boys and girls sent from nearby homes armed with kettles were happily tampering the distribution process to get their share. Anyway, if some people ate and left, many more flocked back after lunch to listen to the music of the ustadan, contrary to other venues.
Of these, there were actually quite a bunch. Apart from Ustad Sardar Mado, the main organizer of the event, one could spot several big names: Ustad Rajab Ali, son of Ustad Muhammad Omar; Ustad Alem Jan; Ustad Ra’is son of Ustad Shaida; Ustad Hayatullah Khan; Ustad Sakhi; Ustad Khaled and Ustad Sanam from Jalalabad, outstanding tabla masters; even Ustad Ghulam Sakhi, father of the Humayun Sakhi of international fame was there.
Apart from sanctioning the ceremony with kisses and blessings to the newly ‘graduated’ students – and after that joining Ustad Sardar in unwrapping the gifts brought by the latter – many of the present ustads also jumped on stage to delight the audience with their music (see an excerpt of Ustad Khaled’s Bol ‘singing’ on the tabla here).
And that display of music from and for Kharabat, of course, was one of the major objectives of the day. As Ustad Sardar repeated to the RTA journalist (the state television correspondent being the lone presence, along with me, of the world beyond the alley): ‘In the last decades people have been in a bad situation because of conflict and poverty, that is why they had reduced the gormani ceremony to a shorter version. So we ustadan decided to revive this ancient tradition of Afghanistan and of Kharabat in its full form, and to have a big dangal, a big concert in such an occasion.’
With all this talk of traditional (institutions) and (legal) customs in nowadays Afghanistan it was a nice show indeed to witness the happy re-enactment of an ancient ritual in a wholly Afghan-led process, at least for a day.
(*) In Kharabat, we are of course talking mainly about professional musicians, people who earn their bread with their rubab, their tabla or their voice – although many shawki ‘amateur’ musicians were also present at the ceremony.
(**) Out of metaphor: I could distinctly hear children in the public commenting on the more skilful passages on the tabla or the rubab.
Revisions:
This article was last updated on 9 Mar 2020
Tags:
Music
Rubab
