Arieb Azhar and His Band__Pakistani Folk Music

$7

Sharp eloquence, humanist politics, and mystic poetries are given a global voice by this singer-songwriter and his acoustic band from Islamabad, Pakistan. Defying easy categorization, Arieb Azhar’s mesmerizing baritone “encompasses about all the emotions life has to offer.” (PRI)  He leads a quartet of musicians in an eclectic mix of urban and folk-based songs grounded in Sufi and other humanist poetries from across Eurasia. Azhar pays tribute to Irish balladeers, Croatian gypsies, Punjabi traders and ancient Sanskrit texts.  “Rather than preserving ‘pure’ art forms, we try to express the human soul the best we can, while making use of all influences we have absorbed along the way.”