Celebration of Sama

The Sufi festival, which started yesterday with a ghazal performance of Shujaat Husain Khan, will see performances by Langas and Manganiyars from Rajasthan and qawwals from Fatehpur Sikri — Salim Hasan Chisthti and troupe. The festival Sama: The Mystic Ecstasy tries to capture the mystery and the spiritual bliss that is intrinsic to Sufism and Sufi music, which is the main component of Sufism.

This festival draws together performers from three prominent strands of music associated with Sufism in the Indian subcontinent — classical, qawwali and folk music. The Sindh and Punjab influences have been imbibed by Rajasthan in such a way that it became the most vibrant region for Indian Sufi music.

Salim Mohammad Chisti and his troupe whose ancestors have been performing and taking care of a dargah in Fatehpur Sikri will sing all their age-old ancestral qawwalis during their performance at the festival. “We have inherited these qawwalis from our ancestors and we have been singing these at dargahs for years. It’s always a spiritual experience for the audience when they listen to the same qawwalis in an auditorium far away, in a city like Mumbai,” says Salim Mohammad who belongs to the Chisti order of Sufism.

Suvarnalata Rao, spokesperson of NCPA, says that the theatre wants to bring to the concert hall these exclusive qawwalis performed in the durgahs which ordinary people don’t otherwise get a chance to listen to. “Poetry and music are central to the practices of Sufism. In Sama the believers of Sufism listen to the music and go into a trance — a state of bliss. We are all so torn between Hindi and Muslim religions but Sufism goes beyond religion. Most people from other faiths don’t get to experience this bliss,” says Rao.