Bollywood Qawwali has had a long history in films since the first time the sound was heard in the cinema. In movies Qawwali It has been in use for almost 80 years.
There is Yusuf Saeed, a filmmaker and researcher in Delhi who has created an online archive of nearly 800 film qawwalis.
Yusuf Saeed has collected film qawwalis of the last 80 years in an online archive.
In this archive of Yusuf Saeed, film qawwalis from 1940 to 2023 will be found. In which some videos are linked from YouTube and some are uploaded from personal collection.
The website named ‘Cine Qawwali.in’ has an archive of film Qawwalis from 1940 to 2023.
Yusuf Saeed started collecting qawwalis about 12 years ago under the name Cinema Qawwali Project and then gradually as more qawwalis were discovered he made them part of the website.
Thus, hundreds of Qawwals were available on YouTube but it was not easy to find them. For this it was made part of the archive with the keyword.
Saeed Yusuf says the archive is the result of his ‘decades of hard work, including a journey to DVDs, CDs and then YouTube.’
Yusuf Saeed, who is an independent filmmaker by profession and is associated with journalism teaching, said that ‘During the years of research, I found hundreds of Qawwals. In which some were in the category of Qawwali and some close to Qawwali, after sifting through them, I compiled a list of all of them and created an online archive.
‘This online archive is called Cinema Qawwali Archive, this archive contains Qawwalis sung in Bombay cinema over the last 80 years. The number of which has reached about 800.
He said that ‘anyone can see and listen to these Qawwalis by going to Cine Qawwali.in.’
According to Yusuf, ‘Searching for Qawwali online is a difficult task. If you search for a Qawwali on YouTube, you will find only a few Qawwalis or the ones that have become popular recently but which are old Qawwalis from movies, it is difficult to find it.’
‘That’s what I worked on and put it in an online archive, so it’s easy to search by year.’
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He further said that ‘Since the sound has started in the movies, there has been Qawwali in the movies. In the 1930s and later films, his soundtracks were lost.’
‘We get the names of their songs, which tells us who wrote them and who sang them. As the first sound film was Alam Ara, it had a song, De De Khuda Ke Naam Pyare. It is said that the song was originally a qawwali, a faqir is singing this qawwali.
Yusuf Saeed added that ‘there are some films of 1936, there are films of 38 and 39. Their names are also very strange. Like a 1936 movie. ‘Miss Frontier Mail’ which contains two Qawwals. Similarly, there is a movie, ‘Brandy Bottle’ which has a Qawwali about alcohol. But this Qawwali is against alcohol.’
At that time there was an anti-liquor movement by Gandhi and others, and this film was made on that. After that came more Qawwals. In 1945, there was a film called ‘Zeenaat’ which had a Qawwali, which was sung only by women. It has the voice of Noor Jahan and others.’
Yusuf Saeed says that ‘1960 is a very special year for Cinema Qawwali. Three big films were released in it. A great Mughal, a fourteenth moon and a rainy night. There must be some Qawwali in these three films. Rainy Night is based on Puri’s Puri Qawwali, about two sisters who want to become Qawwals. In this way the Qawwalis were made and then the color era came.’
Based on his research, Yusuf claimed that ‘Mohammed Rafi’s voice is most common in filmic qawwali. The voice of Ashabhosle is also found in women. After that comes the name of Mana Dey, whose voice was used a lot in Qawwali.’
He added that ‘in the last three decades we see a different Qawwali, with the Qawwalis performed by Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan and AR Rahman, which revolutionized film Qawwali.’
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2024-07-23 02:21:07
