Written by: Nayha Jehangir Khan
Posted on: September 14, 2021 | 
| 中文
The Brothers
The deep understanding of music, cultural sensibility, independent thinking, and empathy showcased by Save The Sitar towards the dying classical music traditions of the subcontinent, is inspiring. Behind this passionate and charitable initiative are two young teenage brothers, Muneeb and Mubeen Irfan Chaudhary, currently residing in Lahore. They have conducted interviews of forgotten musicians and Ustads (teachers) in the Walled City of Lahore, documenting everything they encounter and experience there.
Mubeen Irfan Chaudhary Interviewing Sahawat Ali and Muneeb Irfan Interviewing Hassan Ali
Save The Sitar (STS): We’re two brothers, Muneeb (16) and Mubeen (13), born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA. However, we grew up in Lahore and attended Maktab, a non-traditional school that was founded by an MIT alumnus, where we developed a passion for music. We began learning the tabla and harmonium about five years ago in our music class, and we both enjoyed it so much that we started taking private lessons at home as well. So that’s how both of us learnt the tabla, and Muneeb started to learn the harmonium as well. The harmonium and the tabla complement each other perfectly, so we love playing duets at home!
STS: Save the Sitar is a website dedicated to preserving Pakistan’s classical music. We aim to revive our centuries-old musical traditions, which are dying rapidly. We got the inspiration to start this initiative in September 2019, when we visited Lahore’s Androon Shehr or Inner City, to buy a harmonium. While we were there, we noticed the miserable conditions of musicians who had fallen on hard times. Their bitterness against the government, whose inaction had exacerbated their difficulties in a time when classical music has declined into obscurity, was palpable. Appalled by the situation, we resolved to help them with the encouragement of our parents, and Save the Sitar was born.
An Artist briefing Muneeb about the art of making Sitar
STS: It’s a difficult question, given that we have discovered many amazing people, places, and stories while in the Androon Shehr (Walled City). But, perhaps our favorite finding was our very first interview, when we met an astounding individual: a music director, tabla and harmonium player, and an amateur poet. His name was Tanveer Hussain, and he gave us our first insight into Lahore’s rich musical heritage. At the end of his interview, he amiably offered to recite a poem he had written in his native tongue, Punjabi, in which he criticized the culture of worshipping pop music at the expense of classical.
Muneeb and Mubeen Irfan Chaudhary interviewing Ustad Tanveer Hussain
STS: We believe that our biggest challenge is the lack of time at our disposal to save the dying classical music. Classical music is like a dying patient, and immediate steps are needed to save it before it is lost forever. The apathy shown by the government and NGOs is also a contributing factor to this, as is growing religious extremism. To help win this race against time, we are working as hard as we can to spread our message to every nook and corner. We are also about to publish an Urdu translation of our website, which will help us achieve our long-term goal of reaching out to the public.
Mubeen interviewing an artist at his shop
STS: Our hope is to raise awareness about the miserable state of classical music and its practitioners in Pakistan, and to encourage people to come together to ameliorate the situation. This is, in fact, the one goal around which all of our projects are centered: to see classical music finally given the respect it deserves. However, we realize that societal reform is a long-term goal, a work that requires decades. That’s why our main short-term objective is to provide the remaining classical musicians with a conducive environment, where they can pass their skills to the younger generations, perhaps by setting up a music academy with some help.
Matka
It has been refreshing talking to these passionate, committed and brave little scholars who are truly on the quest to revive and rectify the wrongs inflicted on the impoverished abandoned classical musicians of Lahore city. To realize their desire of reviving classical music at such a tender age is a big challenge for two such young men, but an admirable ambition.
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