Noor Mohammad Shah (

Kashmiri Kashmiri may refer to: * People or things related to the Kashmir Valley or the broader region of Kashmir * Kashmiris, an ethnic group native to the Kashmir Valley * Kashmiri language, their language People with the name * Kashmiri Saikia Baruah ...

: نور محمد شاہ, born in 1954) is an Indian traditional

Sufi Sufism ( ar, ''aṣ-ṣūfiyya''), also known as Tasawwuf ( ''at-taṣawwuf''), is a mystic body of religious practice, found mainly within Sunni Islam but also within Shia Islam, which is characterized by a focus on Islamic spirituality, ...

music performer and songwriter, from ''Baki-Aker'' village in

Handwara Handwara is a sub-district and a town in Kupwara district of Kashmir. It was known as Uttar Machipora until the division of Baramulla district in the 1980s resulting in the formation of two new districts: Kupwara and Bandipora. It is located on ...

town, in the Kupwara District of North Kashmir.

Background

Shah is a traditional

music performer and songwriter and a

virtuoso A virtuoso (from Italian ''virtuoso'' or , "virtuous", Late Latin ''virtuosus'', Latin ''virtus'', "virtue", "excellence" or "skill") is an individual who possesses outstanding talent and technical ability in a particular art or field such as ...

of the rabab. When a boy, in 1970, he was noticed for his talent with the

idiophone An idiophone is any musical instrument that creates sound primarily by the vibration of the instrument itself, without the use of air flow (as with aerophones), strings (chordophones), membranes (membranophones) or electricity ( electrophones) ...

-style Kashmiri

percussion A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Exc ...

instrument of nout (clay pot) by the local singer Mohammad Yousuf Shah who then invited him to his troup for training and work. Having become a musician in his own right, for three decades Shah played and sang for the Sufi saint Ahad Sahib of

Sopore Sopore, known as Suyyapur in antiquity, is a city in the Baramulla district of Jammu and Kashmir, India. It is north-west of Srinagar, and north-east from the city of Baramulla. Sopore Town has Asia's second largest fruit mandi (wholesale m ...

(1930-2010), beginning at the turn of the 1980s

Career

In 2016, the posh Rawalpora (Colony) section of

Srinagar Srinagar (English: , ) is the largest city and the summer capital of Jammu and Kashmir, India. It lies in the Kashmir Valley on the banks of the Jhelum River, a tributary of the Indus, and Dal and Anchar lakes. The city is known for its natu ...

, the summer capital of the

Indian state India is a federal union comprising 28 states and 8 union territories, with a total of 36 entities. The states and union territories are further subdivided into districts and smaller administrative divisions. History Pre-indepen ...

of Jammu and Kashmir, a group of young men for whom he performed filmed Shah on a mobile phone and uploaded the video to the internet. The song which Noor Mohammad sang was "Kato chukh nudibaney walo mashiko myani" was filmed by Shah Jahan Tantray of Rawalpora. The musician sang for them a famous elegy by a 16th-century Muslim poet and ascetic

Habba Khatoon Habba Khatoon (born Zoon; 1554 – 1609; sometimes spelled Khatun), also known by the honorary title ''The Nightingale of Kashmir'', was a Kashmiri Muslim poet and ascetic in the 16th century. Her compositions have been sung and recited countl ...

(who was also Empress Consort of the last Emperor of Kashmir). Without the humble and God-fearing musician's knowledge, this video went viral on the web and unexpectedly made him into a celebrity. Previously, he performed in

mehfil Mehfil (also spelled ''mahfil'') is a formal venue where indoor recreational activities such as poetry (mushaira), singing, music, and dance are entertained in parts of the Indian subcontinent. It is part of Ganga-Jamuni tehzeeb culture. Histo ...

s (

Dervish Dervish, Darvesh, or Darwīsh (from fa, درویش, ''Darvīsh'') in Islam can refer broadly to members of a Sufi fraternity A fraternity (from Latin language, Latin ''wiktionary:frater, frater'': "brother (Christian), brother"; whence, ...

gatherings) and for weddings, while at present his songs are listened to online around the world. In 2018 the Kashmiri and Urdu-language poet and musician Mohammad Muneer Nazir and his band Alif, invited Shah to produce a Kashmiri-language single 'Ride Home'. It proved a great success, watched online by over 3 million viewers. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=coEkDyVqG78&ab_channel=ShahSteel

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Noor Mohammad Shah 1961 births Hindustani instrumentalists Indian Muslims Kashmiri poets Living people People from Jammu and Kashmir Performers of Sufi music Private Music artists Sufi music