Organizer and Chair: Theodore P. Wright, Jr., State University of New York, Albany
Discussant: Bonnie C. Wade, University of California, Berkeley
One of the culturally important roles of Muslims in South Asia which has survived the disruption first of partition and then of Islamization in Pakistan is that of musician, both singer and instrumentalist. A disproportionate number of leading performers in North India and in Mumbai, the capital of "Hindi" cinema (and of course in Pakistan) are still Muslims.
Historically, they found their patrons in royal courts such as Lucknow from both Hindu and Muslim rulers and in Sufi shrines. With the disappearance of the former, such as Rampur, Bhopal and Hyderabad, shortly after independence and the reduction of feudal patronage by land reform, the source of patronage has had to shift to modern entertainment, hence the migration of talent to Mumbai. Muslim musicians have been praised in secular India during Congress rule for their syncretic and assimilative culture, but castigated in Pakistan during the rule of General Ziaul Haq for the same reason.
The panel will investigate the process of change of patronage with the paper of Lorraine Sakata tracing historic continuities of music in sufi shrines, between medieval India and contemporary Pakistan. Daniel Neuman will explicate the way in which hereditary Muslim musicians in Western Rajasthan in India have developed patronage networks through maintenance of the genealogies of both patrons and performers. Regula Qureshi will examine the consequences of the change from feudal to bourgeois patronage, and Brian Silver will delineate the strategies that Muslim classical musicians in both countries have employed to develop new sources of support, including for some the international market.
From Premodern to Postmodern Patronage of Muslim Musicians in Western Rajasthan
Daniel Neuman, University of California, Los Angeles
Historically, hereditary Muslim musicians in the Western Rajasthan districts of Barmer, Jodhpur, and Jaisalmer have complex patronage networks, involved largely with the maintenance of genealogies of their patrons. Sometimes their roles include features in which the Islamic identity of both performer and patron turns out to be significant. This role and function is very much, albeit arguably, premodern in structure. In recent years, however, global patronage structures, which are arguably postmodern in nature, have emerged in which the essential pedigree for patronage relationship is completely irrelevant. This paper, illustrated with short video excerpts, will outline both types as they are currently practiced with suggestions about the social, cultural, and musical ramifications of the shift from the pre- to postmodern forms of patronage.
Musical Patronage at the Sufi Shrines of Pakistan
Hiromi Lorraine Sakata, University of California, Los Angeles
Perhaps the best-known South Asian patron saint of music is Nizamuddin Aulia (d.1325), spiritual guide and patron of Amir Khusrau, 13th–14th century Sufi poet and musician. Khusrau’s compositions in honor of his teacher still remain at the center of the South Asian Sufi repertoire of songs. This tradition of musical patronage emanating from saints to, more generally, the place of the saints, constitutes the major support of Pakistani traditional music to this day. With the use of video examples, I will contrast the patronage of musicians at two important shrines of Pakistan, the shrine of Sheikh Fariduddin Masud Ganj-i-Shakar (d.1265) in Pakpattan and the shrine of Ali b. ‘Uthman al-Jullabi al-Hujwiri (d.1071–2) known as Data Saheb, in Lahore.
Due to the strong support of Sufi traditional music by the institution of shrines in general, the world has come to recognize Pakistani music as synonymous with the spiritual music of the Sufis.
South Asian Muslim Musicians: Post-Independence Patterns of Patronage
Brian Q. Silver, Voice of America
With Indian independence in 1947, the majority of Muslim classical musicians found themselves facing the loss of patronage from the Indian princely states, whose courts had been their primary benefactors for well over a century. This paper will examine the professional and economic strategies that Muslim classical musicians in both India and Pakistan had to develop as they sought new sources of domestic patronage and support, with particular reference to the musicians’ role as members of a minority community in India and of the majority community in Pakistan. The paper will summarize the development of new patterns of patronage from students and disciples, private or corporate patrons, music circles and other sponsors of concerts, educational institutions, government academies, the broadcast media, films and recording companies. The paper will also trace the expansion of musical activities by South Asian Muslim classical musicians into a global context, and will suggest that the internationalization of South Asian music has significantly enhanced their economic opportunities, at home as well as abroad. Several case studies including Ustad Ali Akbar Khan, Ustad Vilayat Khan, Ustad Inrat Khan, Ustad Asad Ali Khan and Zakir Hussain, will be used as illustrative examples.
Changing Relations of Musical Production: Hereditary Musicians Between Feudal and Bourgeois Patronage
Regula Burckhart Queshi, University of Alberta
Nurtured and exploited by feudal patronage, Muslim Mirasi musicians have historically formed the mainstay of art music production in India and Pakistan. Today, bourgeois patronage and competition from Hindu middle class musicians has profoundly challenged their hereditary oral practice even while they retain its musical legimacy. At the bottom is class domination. This paper uses a mode of production perspective to explore how patronage relations are implicated in the way Mirasi musicians have shaped Hindustani music. More specifically, I am interested in the links and contradictions between structures of power, social inequality and religious difference and the production of a highly open-ended, cosmopolitan musical culture.