‘Mehfil Tour’ kicks off in Karachi with electrifying performances

A new live music project aiming to reconnect Pakistani audiences with the country’s diverse musical traditions opened its Karachi chapter this week, blending folk instrumentation from the north with some of Pakistan’s most recognisable contemporary hits. Held in karachi , Mehfil Tour featured producer Zulfiqar Jabbar Khan widely known as Xulfi, alongside performers including Farhan Saeed, Call The Band and the LLMC Ensemble from Hunza. Unlike conventional concert formats focused solely on chart-topping tracks, the evening leaned heavily into reinterpretation combining indigenous instruments from Gilgit-Baltistan and Chitral with contemporary Pakistani music in an attempt to bridge generations and regions. The LLMC Ensemble, trained at the Leif Larsen Music Centre in Hunza, performed with instruments such as the rubab, Dadang, Chitrali sitar and flute, reworking songs that ranged from folk compositions to mainstream favourites including Laari Chooti, Pi Jaon, Aadat and Halka Halka Suroor. The concert also included renditions of Dam Mast Qalandar, Tu Jhoom and Ranjish, with the set moving between Sufi, folk and rock influences. The show concluded with Qataghani, turning the performance into a crossregional musical collaboration rather than a standard pop concert. Speaking at the event, Xulfi said the idea behind Mehfil was to create “a space where different musical worlds could meet each other with honesty, warmth, and excitement.” “We often inherit songs in one form and one memory, but when those same songs are reinterpreted through different instruments, regions, and sensibilities, they begin to reveal new emotional colours,” he said. He added that one of the project’s aims was to give Pakistan’s regional musical traditions “the scale, care, and stage” they deserve. The Karachi show follows the project’s debut edition in Lahore last year and marks the beginning of a planned three-city tour for 2026, with Islamabad and Lahore scheduled to host upcoming performances later this year. Farhan Saeed is a singer-songwriter, actor and entrepreneur. Saeed is the former lead vocalist of the Pakistani band Jal and owns the Cafe Rock restaurant in Lahore. He sings in Urdu and Punjabi. He made his acting debut with the drama De Ijazat Jo Tu (2014). Saeed had his breakthrough with Udaari, for which he received the Hum Award for Best Supporting Actor nomination. He earned wider recognition with his portrayals in Suno Chanda (2018), Suno Chanda 2 (2019) and Mere Humsafar (2021-22). The former won him Hum Award for Best Actor Popular. Saeed made his film debut with Tich Button (2022). Saeed first rose to prominence when he joined the Lahore-based pop rock band Jal, at the age of 17, as a vocalist. Saeed replaced Atif Aslam in 2003, who quit because of musical differences with Jal’s founding member Goher Mumtaz. In September 2011, in an exclusive interview with The Express Tribune, Saeed shocked the fans claiming that he had left Jal to pursue a solo career despite Goher Mumtaz offering him to continue his solo career while being a part of Jal. On 8 September 2011, Saeed’s departure was confirmed by Jal’s guitarist Goher Mumtaz who wished him luck for his solo career. He did a collaboration with Aima Baig, Adnan Qazi and Bilal Saeed for the song “Na cher malangaan nu”. His song with Hania Aamir for Asim Jofa was directed by Qasim Ali Mureed. Junaid Khan is an actor, producer and singer-songwriter. Since the early 2000s Khan is the lead vocalist of the Lahore-based rock band Call, which has released two commercially successful albums, Jilawatan and Dhoom. As an actor he is best known for his roles in serials Sun Yaara (2017), Ishq Tamasha (2018) and Yaariyan (2019). In 2012 Khan was nominated at the Lux Style Awards in two different categories Best TV Actor for the serial Dil Ki Lagi and Best Album of the Year for the album Dhoom. Explaining his transition to acting which happened later in his career, he says that having an artist mother who’s a gold medallist in Fine Arts, he himself indulged in artistic activities during his student days, namely drawing and theatre, the latter se