It was with relief that one heard the news that the Faiz Festival was to be held at the Alhamra, relief because for two years public activities had been put on hold. In the beginning, one thought that the brief phase of Covid pandemic would blow over but with the passage of time the mutation of the virus neutralized every step to normalise and proved to be an exercise in optimism. These bouts of hope were followed by more series of lockdowns and restrictions.

But, with the number of infections going down the world over, life is rushing back to normal and it appears that the nightmare might be over. So, Faiz Festival was a relief because it had very little online activity. As the world struggled to gain momentum, the hybrid mode of digital and face-to-face interaction had become more or less the norm. Despite the opportunity that the digital substitution created, the desire to get back to the venue, sit in the auditorium, stroll in the lawns, loll around the stalls, browse books, catch a snack and above all be assured by the presence of likeminded people made the festival not only worthwhile but also had a kind of a restorative touch about it.

The Festival had the familiar ring to it – the lectures, talk shows, book launches, discussion rounds, remembering those who have left us and many cultural happenings on the sidelines. Then there was the component of evenings programmes comprising more formal reading, music, and theatre.

Faiz, in a way, was very lucky that he was sung by some of the leading vocalists of our times. There has been a tradition of singing the verses of leading poets both in the subcontinent and Iran. This provides an opportunity for people to be more actively involved in the poetry to be part of it as a performance as compared to listening to it. The mushaira in our tradition was a kind of a mid-way point between the reading of poetry and an actual performance. The audience ever willing for a spot-on response charged the atmosphere and brought more life to the proceedings. From hand-me-down recipes it became in a way a two-way exchange where the words said more than they may have appeared to.

Faiz in a way was very lucky that he was sung by some of the leading vocalists of our times. There has been a tradition of singing the verses of leading poets both in the subcontinent and more so in Iran.

Music too made poetry recitation into a two-way thing and the sur evoked more than the words could ever do. Tahira Syed sang what had been sung by some of the leading vocalists of both India and Pakistan. The Noor Jehan numbers, Mehdi Hassan’s highly melodic renderings, Iqbal Bano’s high-end performances, extremely mellifluous ones by Nayyara Noor and those including a few by Begum Akhter have been etched on the sensibilities and any repetition by vocalists – no matter what the quality – brings back the resonance and the richness of the original numbers. One regret has always been that Nayyara Noor was never given nor did she fully avail the opportunity to exploit her talent. Her contribution has been relatively small after she sang some Faiz poems and ghazals composed by Arshad Mehmood in the 1970s mostly in the programmes Such Gap and Taal Matol.

Tahira Syed has been singing for over fifty years after she made a sensational debut in the 1970 election transmission with some of her mother’s numbers and a few of her own playful items. Since then she has been on the scene not as productive or prolific as professional singers have been because she has not been a professional in the strict sense of the term. She has admitted many a time on air that she was slave-driven by her mother to learn to sing where she was given the opportunity to be the shagird of ustads like Akhter Hussain and Nazar Hussain. But, she has continued her intermittent career by reappearing after long absences. The Faiz Festival, in the past, too, has been an occasion for her to make an appearance in public.

Some of the participants were happily able to cross over from the east. Most rominent among them was Muzaffar Ali. He has a huge following in Pakistan and his Umrao Jan Ada was highly appreciated by ordinary film-goers as well as those who carry a chip on their shoulder. The attention to detail, the creating of original ambience and the tale of a tragedy well told had all merged into the film further augmented by Khayyam’s musical score. Many have identified his person with the niceties of cultural practices that gave Luchknow most of its fame and notoriety. The informed talk and the views had been a much awaited feature in this as well as in the Faiz Festivals.

Zia Moheyuddin has been a phenomenon. Despite his many other talents and achievements (acting, direction, management, leadership), he has been reading the texts in various languages mainly in Urdu and English to audiences mostly in India and Pakistan or the diaspora for over thirty years. The text is very well selected and the delivery is impeccable, setting an example to revive the art of public reading. He has admitted that he was inspired by John Gilguid’s renderings of Shakespeare and thought to emulate him in the subcontinent with mostly local texts. He has been very successful in that and has always found an audience that is ready to lap it all up – the style and substance. He has been breaking ground and was one of the first subcontinental actors to make a name for himself on the West End with his playing of Dr Aziz in Passage to India. There are few probably who can match him in India as well and one wonders if anyone in the succeeding generations has the commitment and the ability to follow his example and revive the art to the level where it become institutialised.

The author is a culture critic based in Lahore