Sufi Music Quotes

As a teen, I enjoyed Sufi music and ghazals the most. But as my career began, I drifted off to playback and other streams over the years.

Sufi music talks about connecting people. It talks about connecting hearts and connecting man with God. Everything that talks about connection is Sufi.

I am very fond of ghazals. I like ghazals from Jagjit Singh and Sir Ghulam Ali.

I get good references from a wide range of music. Something who's been a good influence in the last few years is Qawwali music. If you listen to a Qawwali singer like Aziz Mian - he's like James Brown. Qawwali is like Pakistani gospel-jazz. It's emotional, but it's also improvised, and it's all about that sacred-and-profane tightrope.

When I talk of primordial innocence, I hear it in Sufi music with the nay flute. I see it in Coptic icons, in most traditional art, particularly art of the American Indian. I find the texts extraordinarily beautiful and very childlike and very simple. I've been particularly interested in American Indian texts.

My personal favourites include J. J. Cale, R. D. Burman, Mehdi Hassan, and Ghulam Ali.

I'm interested in Qawwali and the blues.

These three elements are called Qawwali, and they've got to be there.

People listened to Farsi texts, and to the great texts of our Baba Bulleh Shah, Khwaja Ghulam Farid, Mian Mohammad Bakhsh Jehlmi. People do listen to it these days, but much less than in those days.

There are many similarities between Sai Baba and me. He believed there is only one God, and so do I. He loved Sufi music; so do I.

Punjabi music is loved across the globe.

I started listening to Sufi music when I was 21.

I was just studying with my father, a very difficult task for me since he was a great, great Qawwali singer.

I have got a lot of appreciation from people and they really like my voice in Sufi songs, so I will continue with that, but I'm also experimenting with other types of songs.

I am not a Sufi, but I follow the Sufi.

To be a qawwal is more than being a performer, more than being an artist. One must be willing to release one's mind and soul from one's body to achieve ecstasy through music. Qawwali is enlightenment itself.

My father gave me formal education in raagdari. He died in Lahore in 1964 when I was 13. I was in the tenth year of school, and my father's brother took me into the qawwali ensemble and started giving me formal education in qawwali.

You've got to sing from the depths of the heart. Without heart, you cannot be a Qawwal.

Istanbul is inspiring because it has its own code of architecture, literature, poetry, music.

Ghazal singing will come back with a bang.

I love Punjabi Folk.

The Marathi film 'Natrang' has amazing songs. I also like and have sufi and folk music.

Hildegard von Bingen conveys spiritual ecstasy, if we're talking of Western music. What bothers me about Western music is that it doesn't have an esoteric dimension in the way the music of the East has, whether it be Byzantine chant, the music of the Sufis, or Hindu music.

I think that Sufism fits all over the world. The concept is not anything that fits standard Western ideas - it's always related to culture, to music, to religion. It is a dominant religion in Senegal.

Some of my fans tell me that my voice is more suited for romantic numbers, some others say I do Sufi songs better. But that just goes to say that people are more aware of the different genres now. More people are getting exposed to sufi music because of Bollywood, which is good.