Text & Interview: Bulat Khalilov
Originally published on 3/4.sk
Today, honiuhoni’s discography is not extensive, featuring only three releases since 2022. However, the label has already gained prominence, primarily due to the Baloch master of the local variation of the zither, Ustad Noor Bakhsh.
The elderly musician from the small village of Pensi has become a prominent figure at the label, performing at various European venues, ranging from key so-called World Music showcases such as Womex to more interdisciplinary festivals like the Dutch Le Guess Who?
The Baloch virtuoso has recently returned from his first North American tour. And while, for the untrained listener, Ustad Noor Bakhsh may be just another representative of “oriental classical music” or at best a “Pakistani virtuoso”, for the Karachi-based label the context is much more complex. After all, Balochistan is a complex region with a long history of violence from both Pakistan and Iran.
Building on this, working with Baloch music is a very delicate and demanding endeavour for Daniyal.
In a short interview, we talked about the position of responsibility, policy articulation, external and internal views and the difficult journey from Western indie music to the musical traditions of Pakistan.
Bulat Khalilov
Tell me how and why you created honiunhoni. What’s the idea behind the label, and why is it called that?
Daniyal Ahmed
honiunhoni is a poetic play in Urdu describing what is possible and what is impossible. It can be loosely translated as impossible possibilities. The name evokes chance encounters and surprising musical moments. Before I started the label, it was just an Instagram account where I posted videos of playing with musicians I met. I started the label thinking it’s not right to keep doing recordings of wonderful music and not think of ways it can be shared with the world in an equitable and ethical way that also benefits the artists and their communities. What really sparked it was the initial reactions to the recordings of Ustad Noor Bakhsh, little videos I shared on my Instagram. That made me reflect on how people around the world genuinely love him and his music. I wanted to find ways to amplify this appreciation and ensure he receives more than just views, likes and internet virality – something significant that truly honours the quality of his art. So my goal has been to share my ethnographic musical research and recordings with the world in a way that could benefit the communities I work with, while also spreading the joy of these musical styles to wider audiences.
BK
Behind labels that refer to “traditional” or “ethnic” music there are often Europeans or Americans traveling to various countries. You record and release music from different regions of Pakistan, your homeland. How does this affect the specifics of the label? What strengths and weaknesses does this entail?
DA
I think being Pakistani and working with musicians from the region perhaps gives me more room to form deeper relationships with the musicians and their communities. Thanks to this, I can easily immerse myself in their worlds, being able to pick up on the minor nuances of the way they play, think and live. This allows me to form relationships with the musicians that can mature and build trust over time. So as a partial “insider”, as I’m still not fully local for many of these communities, it allows me to portray a certain richness, not just with the music, but also with lifestyles and humour. This comes with having a common language to speak and knowing the cultural codes. It can provide more comfort. Hopefully, this is present also in the recordings and the ethnographic filming that accompanies them.
However, being enmeshed probably has its drawbacks, too. There might be several things that are too familiar for me to portray with the kind of interest that an outsider may have. This is typical as the insider-outsider’s observations are bound to be different, and they may potentially see things that I don’t see, or take for granted. In this context, a Western individual may possess more power, a better network or other privileges to enhance the work. It’s certainly a challenging question to answer and speculate about!
BK
You promote your artists mainly in Europe. What’s the reason for this? Are you also working to develop a domestic scene?
DA
We started with Europe simply because that’s where we ended up making the first connections for touring artists. Noor Bakhsh had his first North American tour this September-October. This helped us to branch out into a new territory. It was a matter of coincidence, and meeting the right people made things happen first in Europe.
I was deeply involved in the domestic scene in Karachi and organised independent shows in my city for many years before I started promoting artists abroad. I used to run Karachi Community Radio (KCR) with my friend. We did a lot of local shows mostly in the electronic/indie genre. Other than that, for the last four years, I have worked closely with the All Pakistan Music Conference in Karachi, where I serve as General Secretary. This organisation has been doing seminal work to promote traditional arts for decades. With them, I’ve worked to put on performances, as well as on documentation projects about the great hereditary master musicians, recordings and public engagement initiatives.
Unfortunately, the domestic scene is plagued by the absence of state support and well-funded cultural institutions. The only sustainable alternative that remains is getting corporate funding and promoting brands and their products through your music and productions. Whether this decision was wise or not, I chose not to take that route and to remain independent, not seeking support from corporations. In any case, I don’t think my style of working is too appealing to the commercial sector, which seeks more glitz and glamour. This is also the reason why branching out and seeking opportunities abroad becomes more of a necessity.
BK
What are the differences between Pakistani and European audiences?
DA
There are substantial differences in the way of listening. Pakistani audiences are much more into vocal music than poetry. Lyricism is such an integral part of our culture. They have less of an appetite for instrumental music, which I have focused on. Western audiences can’t access the vocal music at such a level. Therefore, the instrumental music is automatically easier to access and enjoy.
I think the level of musical education in the Western world and the way musical culture has developed makes this audience much more accepting of all kinds of sounds. Their palette is much broader in that sense. It’s these historical differences and socio-cultural realities that have developed the ears of both groups differently. People in Pakistan love music, but the way that music has been villainised and sidelined for all kinds of reasons in past decades has had a detrimental effect on our listening, and that’s very tragic.
BK
We once discussed the fact that European promoters, and part of the audience, look for an oriental, “spiritualistic” and psychedelic vibe in the music you release. Do you aim to break these stereotypes, or do you find it more beneficial to leverage them in order to provide a platform for your artists?
DA
These stereotypes are so uninteresting to me that I’m not trying to actively break them or use them either. In the work I do, I sometimes think that both things tend to happen anyway. I would never use words like “oriental” since this is not the way we look at ourselves. This spiritualism has been so much exploited for marketing purposes that it has really lost its charm. It’s something to be felt rather than spoken about, and it comes across in the music if it’s presented in a certain way. I couldn’t bring myself to use these kinds of words to describe our music because it just doesn’t sound natural to me. But these metaphors are so ingrained in this domain that, even if you don’t evoke them, they’re already there in many minds, and so they will automatically come into play.
I’ve made my peace with these issues, and if such ideas help us to promote the music and the artists, that’s fine with me, too. Still, I don’t need to consciously play this card, because it’s already here!
BK
To an outside listener who has not delved into the context, Pakistan may look like a monolithic country with a unified Pakistani culture, but the reality is more complicated than that. For example, Ustad Noor Bakhsh is from Balochistan, a conflict region that’s experiencing complexities from both the Pakistani and Iranian sides. What specifics and responsibilities does that entail for you?
DA
Yes, Pakistan is really an amalgam of diverse cultures, languages, peoples and music representing a certain part of South Asia. This is much bigger than the region we call Pakistan. While it shares many similarities, it also possesses distinct differences that set it apart. Working with Baloch artists is tricky. I have had to be very careful to make sure the artists aren’t seen in a way that would put their lives and the security of their families in danger. When you promote marginalised and underrepresented artists, the work is inherently political. I don’t feel the need to cry out loud about their marginalisation or underrepresentation either; that’s not what interests me. The music and the artists themselves are fascinating for me. But there’s a responsibility to be careful, and not be seen as supporting this or that side if you want to keep doing this in a safe and sustainable way in the long run. And as tough as it might be sometimes, I hope we manage to continue this safely without getting embroiled in any conflict. The truth is that the artists I work with aren’t partial to any side of these conflicts, and I therefore don’t feel the need to impose any politics on them, much less my own.
BK
Do you think the increase in popularity has a direct impact on the artists you are representing? Ustad Noor Bakhsh, for example?
DA
I think Noor is the best person to ask how he feels. My perception is that he feels great, and after the kind of tough life he’s lived, all of this is a massive relief for him in many ways, and it makes him very happy to get international recognition. But more than that, there’s all the outpouring of love and respect he receives locally because of the way he’s managed to represent his music and culture globally. I think Noor is a very astute observer of audiences, and he’s figured out that Europeans, generally speaking, just love to dance and move, and that’s not too dissimilar from local audiences, too, of course. So when he’s playing in Europe, I think what he’s trying to do is to get his audiences into a state of “trance” or dhamaal, as we say in our local languages. And he’s just fantastic in that he almost always manages to get audiences into that state no matter what the context of the performance is, and therein lies his mastery!
BK
You announced that you will be part of the Le Guess Who? festival / COSMOS. What do you think about the system of modern international festivals? Do they really contribute something new and very equal to society, or it is just business as usual?
DA
I collaborated with the festival as a COSMOS¹ ambassador. In this context, we produced a short film about our culture. It was a great experience, and the freedom that they gave us to approach and make the film as we wanted was amazing. In the case of the Le Guess Who? (LGW?), I can see that they use the momentum, respect and sustained sources of funding they have gathered to take risks and invite artists, irrespective of what the social media numbers look like. If a certain artist appeals to them, they invite them, and they don’t care about anything else. This is wonderful, of course, and gives a lot of artists a very nice opportunity to perform.
Not every festival is the same. There are many out there which operate much more like businesses. Forward-thinking festivals like LGW? with their structure and audience are probably still more of a rarity and not the norm.
On the question of contributing something new, they can definitely do that. I don’t think it’s about equality, but about a matter of taste. I don’t think there’s any way around taste and what curators like. So it can’t ever be truly equal for everybody, but the fact that LGW? doesn’t care about social media numbers or views is really refreshing. But from the point of view of someone representing artists from Pakistan who barely gets to perform outside the country, I wouldn’t even be so picky with festivals, haha.
BK
Most of the diverse, culturally rich and adventurous festivals happen in the West, even if they are full of musicians from the so-called Global South. Why do you think this situation doesn’t change? Or am I wrong? Should we start to create a cultural system/industry in our home regions? How is it possible to do so, and do we really need this?
DA
I think the fact that most of these festivals take place in the West isn’t a coincidence – it’s very much a matter of history, money and power. Western countries, their governments and corporations, have created a system where there’s a lot of money for this kind of stuff. Rich countries with a valuable currency are obviously a great pull factor to attract artists from all over the world. This cultural politics, over the years, has also created very open-minded and cultivated audiences open to all kinds of music. We would, of course, like to have this kind of stuff in our countries, too. The fact is the money simply isn’t there. I’ve worked for years putting on shows and working to put on festivals in Pakistan, but it’s extremely tough. If we had access to this kind of funding, and if the financial situation was different, we would have a lot more initiatives such as these also here. But the historical inequalities between our regions mean that this isn’t very likely anytime soon, although, of course, there are people all over the Global South who are trying to make that happen despite the odds, and some are succeeding, too. We need these things more badly in our countries, which have such few opportunities for listening and musical experience. It’s just very difficult to make it happen, primarily due to financial reasons.
BK
As a label, you work with regional classical/folk music. Do you consider this to be contemporary music? Do you plan to work with non-traditional music practices or electronic/non-acoustic instruments?
DA
Yes, I do see this music as contemporary. What has interested me more is how this music keeps evolving, as well as the experimentalism and newness with which artists within these genres perform. More so because these genres are falsely perceived as unchanging and fixed, even though that’s far from the truth. I don’t have any boundaries in my mind or any rules that I won’t work with electronic or non-acoustic instruments. During my time as co-founder of Karachi Community Radio, I worked a lot in these genres. However, I thought that my efforts would be more valuable if I focused not just in the direction of music I like, but on serving artists who don’t have the means or the know-how to navigate the complex terrain of modern music distribution, digital platforms and social media. So I decided to use whatever little I knew to help these artists and project their work further. If I feel that there’s an electronic or non-acoustic artist or project that I think would benefit from my work, then I would work with that, too.
BK
What kind of music are you into as a listener today? What was your musical background in your childhood/teenage years?
DA
As a child, I grew up listening to a lot of Western rock and indie music. Through my father, I was fortunate enough to have heard a lot of Punjabi folk music, too. When I started learning our Hindustani Raag music, my listening started to be much more focused on that genre. Then with my studies and teaching in ethnomusicology, I started exploring music from different parts of the world much more. Over the years, I’ve been fortunate to develop a taste for very diverse kinds of music. But, as with all tastes, I have certain limitations myself, and I don’t listen to much electronic music or hip-hop and rap, although there are exceptions to that, too.
To be honest, these days I’m not seeking out new music the way I used to. Maybe it’s just a phase of not overlistening too much. The amount of new music that comes out these days is overwhelming to keep up with; there are universes to explore. But I think all this has made music curation so important. I enjoy listening to FIP, a French radio station that has hand-curated playlists, and sometimes also NTS Radio or BBC Sounds, which can be a nice way to encounter new music without making too much effort.
This article is brought to you by 3/4.sk as part of the EM GUIDE project – an initiative dedicated to empowering independent music magazines and strengthening the underground music scene in Europe. Read more about the project at emgui.de.
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