He said he chose to compose them into ragas because a raga, be it Bhairavi or Darbari, always sounds fresh and once a ghazal is composed in that raga, the ghazal will always remain popular and never die. It could be Yeh dhuan kahan se uthta hai or Yeh rakh akhir dil na banjaye or Ranjish hi sahi.Īnd much later after another concert in the US capital, when I interviewed him on behalf of Voice of America, he confirmed all of what I had thought about him and his magic. Basically, what I felt was that only Mehdi Hassan could bring the real meaning and spirit of the ghazals and tell you with great ease what the shayar (the poet) really wants to say. I think, it was his first live concert in Washington and I was excited that I am going to see him sing live on stage, almost roobaroo (face to face).Īnd for more than two hours he showed us how a ghazal should be sung, how it can be composed in an Indian raga to make it immortal, and how and when, which part of the verse should be highlighted. It so happened, the next time I heard Mehdi Hassan was after I had arrived in Washington as a student in the 1970s. So far the only ghazals I had heard were all sung by Begum Akhtar such as Aye muhabbat tere anjam pe rona aya. But soon I found one and we were enthralled to find out that it was a recording of an upcoming Pakistani ghazal singer Mehdi Hassan who was singing his famous ghazal, Gulon mein rang bhare. But the problem was I, being just a student, did not have a reel-to-reel tape recorder. Knowing our taste for ghazals, I completely believed him. He insisted that he has never heard such a voice, such meticulous pronunciation of Urdu and such articulation of the words, especially while singing ghazals by famous Urdu poets. The first I heard about Mehdi Hassan, whom now I call an amazing "ghazal traash" (sculptor of ghazals), was in 1966 when a friend of mine brought me a reel-to-reel tape of a Pakistani Radio recording of something he said would spellbind me. The article was originally published on June 13, 2012. Mehdi Hassan passed away on Jand was considered one of the greatest ghazal singers of all time.