All’s well that ends well

The last performance of Napa’s musical fusion night was the highlight of the show.

KARACHI:

National Academy of Performing Arts (Napa) has already left all the theatre aficionados speechless with their outstanding performances and deft command on the field of theatre. However Saturday was a chance for music graduates to flaunt their skills on Napa’s musical fusion night. The show was hosted by the well-known Chef Shae (who also happens to be a music student at Napa).

The evening kick-started with a commendable instrumental cover of Ray Charles’ “I Don’t Need No Doctor” performed by Napa graduate Danish Hassan. Next in the line-up was Zulfiqar Ali Shah, who sang a few original pop-ghazals taking the night towards the classical side. The performer managed to give the audience few moments of excellent tabla and keyboard fusion. The third performer was Nadir Abbas, who tried to bring a more progressive rock flavour to the musical programme, but received appreciation for his vocals and not for the compositions, which sounded weak and diluted. Abbas managed to excite the audience for a bit until Farrukh Ahmed made his way to the stage and sang a number of self-composed orginal soundtracks which unfortunately sounded amateurish. While Ahmed has a voice that may hit a chord with the Pakistani listeners, for now he needs to work hard on his compositions.

It seemed that Napa had saved the best performance for the last and Ahsan Bari and his band were a pleasant surprise for a tired audience.

Ahsan Bari steals the show

Bari made the music that you expect young, talented and professionally educated musicians to make. Since his was the last act of the show, Bari had the responsibility of lifting the spirits of a tired crowd and he fulfilled it perfectly. The promising artist was creative enough to get the audience’s attention by beatboxing for almost a minute before starting his performance.

The act was called ‘Rocky Funky Fusion’, which confused the audience at first because it sounded cheesy. However, once the artist was done with his first performance, no one cared about the titles and everyone was looking forward to the next act. Bari was joined by Sara Haider on supporting vocals, Gul Mohammad on sarangi and backing vocals, Abdul Aziz Kazi on drums, Zeeshan Pevaiz bass guitar and Shahid Rehman rhythm guitars.

The first track was an instrumental piece call “Bariology” which had an interesting arrangement of guitar and drums, as both the instruments were played like the sitar and the tabla are usually played. In “After Effects”, Bari and Haider contributed their vocals and presented a lyrical masterpiece.

One wished that the sound system was better and Haider’s — who had a great stage presence — vocals were more audible. Later the group performed “Napa Funk”, which was an experimental rendition of funk music with the undertones of sargam.

The last and the most uplifting number of the night was “Urna Chahta Hoon” and that is when Bari introduced the small yet impactful instrument called kazoo. A palm-sized instrument usually used to attract ducks on duck hunts was used by Bari to create the sounds of a saxophone and sometimes even the trumpet.

With their creative music-selling gimmicks and powerful stage presence, Bari and his band members owned the night and raised the bar of fusion music performances.

Published in The Express Tribune, March 11^th, 2012.