Ustad Jaffar Hussain unveils ‘Guldasta’

Latest drop is his debut solo release

Guldasta, a five-track album of raags, thumri, and Kafi on Clarinet, by Ustad Jaffar Hussain Randhawa has just been released via the Karachi based music outfit and record label, honiunhoni. Jaffar Hussain is accompanied by Riaz Ahmed on the tabla and Muneer Hussain on harmonium.

Guldasta, meaning bouquet, is his debut solo release. It was recorded live, on the rooftop of his house in Shahdara, on a foggy winter afternoon, as he sat with his favourite accompanists under the Alam, stated a press release.

He titled the album Guldasta because he imagines a bouqet of flowers as the mixing of various raags and styles. The album was recorded on location by Daniyal Ahmed (founder, honiunhoni) and mixed and mastered by Nizar Lalani. The recording is filmed and edited by Daniyal Yousaf, a film maker and sociologist who teaches at LUMS.

Abeera Kamran has designed the album cover. The set design and album title was chosen by Jaffar Hussain himself. The first track from the album, a Thumri in Raag Pahadi, can be viewed on the honiunhoni YouTube channel.

Jaffar Hussain is Pakistan’s most senior and accomplished Clarinet maestro. He is amongst a handful of people in all of South Asia, who carries on the now rare tradition of playing Hindustani classical music on the Clarinet, a western instrument not typically heard in the performances of raags and thumris.

His grandfather founded the Punjab Band in the mid-20^th century, and his father continued leading the troupe, making his name in a time of fierce competition amongst brass bands in Punjab such as the famous Babu Band and the Sohni Band.

He himself learnt from Ustad Sohni Khan and is also heavily influenced by the great Ustad Sadiq Ali Mando, one of the most well-known classical Clarinet players in the subcontinent.

What sets Jaffar Hussain apart are his masterful performances of classical forms like raag, thumri and Kafi on the Clarinet, on which he manages to reproduce the melodic ornamentations that are central to this music and simultaneously display a creative rigour with his approach to rhythm (laya) and layakaari (rhythmic interplay). 

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