FIRST PERSON: ‘In The Sufi Line Of Work Your Love, Passion And Devotion Are Consuming’
By Sonya Rehman
Saieen Zahoor tells his story in his own words.
lt all started with a dream. A dream which Saieen — at the tender age of seven — could not comprehend the implication of. And it was this very dream which changed the then young Saieen’s life forever.
Seated in the Rafi Peer Workshop office in Lahore on a humid Saturday afternoon, Saieen Zahoor sits before me in all his glory; his frame petite and slim, his fingernails painted orange (with fading mehndi) and his stone and zircon-encrusted rings (one on each finger) glittering ever so often.
His black turban is set firmly on his head, under which a dark and slightly greasy mane of hair just about touches his narrow shoulders.
Saieen’s face is dark and weather-beaten, with deeply etched lines that seem to speak of voyages (both internal and external) and eyes — deep-set, kohl-rimmed, astute and alert.
“Beti,” he says, “it’s a long story,” as I ask him how his path led him down that of the ek tara (the traditional instrument that Saieen plays) and the dervaish way of life.
Tasneem Peerzada (one of the directors of the Rafi Peer Theatre Workshop) is sitting with us as a translator. This is because Saieen speaks pure and thait Punjabi — the kind that I understand little of, and the kind that Tasneem converses and understands with ease.
“I was seven years old when I started seeing a hand which would emerge from a grave in my dreams. Afterwards, I wouldn’t be able to go back to sleep. My parents would scold and ask me what kept bothering me night after night, but I never told them about my dream. Every night for seven continuous years I had the same dream.”
During this time, Saieen met a dervaish who lived in a graveyard, played the ek tara and sang. “He had magic in his voice,” remembers Saieen. The young Saieen began sitting with the dervaish and contended himself by learning the ek tara from him.
“He would sing songs about pain and loss. They were folk tales which I would sing only in Seraiki (a dialect spoken in the region Saieen was brought up in).”
Saieen told the dervaish about his recurring dream who advised him to look for a darbar and when he found it, only then would he understand the significance of his dream. “I kept looking for the darbar and in the process I came across many dargas. Eventually I found a darbar at Uch Sharif which also had a grave. I sat there and started playing my ek tara.”
Days slid into weeks, weeks fluttered into months and months danced into years before Saieen’s travels, earnestness and hard work eventually paid off. He met the late Dildar Parvez Bhatti, then a well-known PTV compere and show host, and who helped Saieen strike a deal with the channel. This resulted in a recording (of Bulleh Shah’s poetry) sung by Saieen that was telecast across Pakistan. Three more programmes followed swiftly after the success of the first one.
Saieen’s path then crossed that of Taj Naseem Aqsi, who put him through to the National Arts Council and Lok Virsa where he performed countless times. These performances — which raised Saieen’s popularity to considerable heights — led him overseas, where Saieen performed at festivals. Be it America, Canada, India, Europe or Japan, Saieen has performed everywhere and continues to do so ever since he began working with the Rafi Peer Theatre Workshop in 2000.
In 2005, recognising Saieen’s gift of music, BBC Radio awarded him the prestigious World Music Award, which further set in motion Saieen’s expedition of his career in music. Not that award titles and publicity matters to Saieen who is in essence a true dervaish, and who sings Baba Bulleh Shah’s poetry for the love of it. Yet, the recognition from a foreign media corporation to a humble, Pakistani artiste can be quite encouraging. “I sang one of Bulleh Shah’s verses on love and devotion,” Saieen says about the song that won him the BBC award. “When you sing with sincerity, the message gets across to everybody — whether they understand it or not.”
This year, Saieen’s debut album composed entirely of songs based on the poetry of Bulleh Shah was released by the Rafi Peer Theatre Workshop. How long did the recording take, I ask him. “Only one-and-a-half hours,” says Saieen proudly. “But it took nine days for the video shoot.”
So what does Saieen make of local music? He ponders before answering, “I love and appreciate music about Allah. But for me music about people or worldly things denotes greed which I don’t like, to be honest. But any song which carries with it the name of the Almighty and His praise, I love.
“In this Sufi line of work”, he tells me, “your love, passion and devotion are all-consuming.”
Towards the end of the interview I learn that Saieen cannot read nor write. How, then, does he sing and memorise Bulleh Shah’s verses? “I draw them,” he says simply. Tasneem hands him a piece of paper and a pen — and within five minutes Saieen draws four lines of verse. These are chub by stick figures with round heads — some smiling and some sad — while other drawings denote flowers and pathways. After Saieen is done drawing, Tasneem writes the verse in Urdu just below it. After she’s done, I fold it neatly and tuck it into my purse.
From darbar to darbar, and now to his frequent globe-trotting for Sufi festivals — how has the experience been for Saieen so far? Answering in the affirmative, he goes on to narrate an unpleasant incident which he finds hard to forget. “On one of our tours we went to Denmark, Brussels and Belgium, and from there straight to England. We did a show there, and during my performance I started spinning. Before I knew it, two foreigner girls had grabbed me by both arms and started spinning with me. At the time I was actually singing a verse about being very close and connected to Allah. Therefore, I immediately stopped performing. A man from the Pakistani consulate then took me aside and threatened me…he said if I wouldn’t dance with those girls, things would get ugly for me. But I explained that I was a dervaish and that what I was doing was spiritual — and this did not permit me to dance with women. But the man threatened me and I was scared, and therefore had to comply. I had to dance with the girls by force and it made me feel terrible, otherwise I feel elated during my performances.
“Music is nutrition for the soul,” he says. “I can perform all night. Once you start reciting sufiana kalam you forget your physical being.” And what about the dream that he once had as a child — has it stopped? “Yes, it has. But the blessings of that dream continue to this day,” says Saieen, his eyes lighting up like fireflies in the dark.
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FIRST PERSON: ‘In The Sufi Line Of Work Your Love, Passion And Devotion Are Consuming’ -DAWN Images; July 27, 2008