Kashmiri Sufi strain fades with the last of its maestros

A noted musicologist and Kashmir’s only contemporary music theorist, Aziz begun a lonely journey to find and preserve lost melodies four decades ago. He managed to return to the Sufi tradition 42 of these lost strains. Without official patronage or funding, Aziz interviewed musicians for clues for the melodies, passed traditionally from one generation to other.

Painstakingly, he notated the melodies and built a database even as he taught Kashmiri classical music at foreign universities, especially in the United States.

Sofiyan Mosique, a style of choral music performed by five to 10 musicians, has already lost 130 of the 180 melodies referred to in ancient texts. His penchant for musicology, and decades of research and four published volumes on the subject — Koshur Sargam — brought back the music from the brink of extinction. Hafiza, the once-celebrated solo dance form by women associated with the Sofiyana Mosique, however, has been lost.

The Sufi music and the mystic dance were brought to the valley from Central Asia in the 15th century and musicians still sing Persian poems. In fact, several of the instruments used in this music form too face extinction. The comforting melody of Saz-e-Kashmir—a near-extinct Kashmiri string instrument and — the Valley’s own santoor, the rhythmic rabab and its dhokra are slowly silenced.

Aziz, born in 1928, lived a hard life, pursuing his dreams as a musicologist, especially as the J-K Government never came forward to help his project. Koshur Sargam, the only monumental work on Kashmiri Sufi music, was possible entirely due to his efforts. Now, as the state government exhorts the Sufi tradition, Aziz’s death comes as a testimony to a silent crusade that went unrecognised.