Jun 18, 2025 09:37 AM IST An integral a part of all his live performance setlists, Papon admits that a big part of the viewers that requests him to sing ghazal at gigs are faculty college students. Besides soulful movie and non-film tracks, a style of music that’s extraordinarily near singer Papon’s coronary heart is ghazal. An integral a part of all his live performance setlists, the musician admits that a big part of the viewers that requests him to sing ghazal at gigs are faculty college students. Singer Papon on his current go to to Lucknow “After Jagjit Singh (late singer), no one has created fresh sound for ghazal; what we hear today are mostly classics. I’m trying to change that and the response has been encouraging. Nowadays, college students and young audiences request me to sing ghazal at my concerts, which proves that Indians still have a deep-rooted love for the art form. We must revive it,” says the singer, who is about to launch two ghazal albums. Speaking concerning the albums he’s engaged on, the Moh Moh Ke Dhagey (Dum Laga Ke Haisha, 2015) singer provides, “I’m just giving the final touches to the album before jetting off for my international (US) tour. I will release them as soon as I am back.” Lamenting the “shortage of good ghazal writing today”, which had been mastered by poets resembling Nida Fazli, Qateel Shifai and Bashir Badr, the 49-year-old shares, “Ghazal writing is an art, and just knowing Hindi and Urdu isn’t enough. While some still write ghazal, the numbers are few.” However, he’s hoping to revive the music kind. “Film music overshadows the genre, but with the internet, non-film music can thrive again. The void left by Jagjit Singh and Pankaj Udhas is vast, but there’s potential for ghazal to flourish even now,” says the singer. Papon provides, “I now curate ghazal-only shows in large auditoriums and most of them are sold out. At Jashn-e-Rekhta, I performed for 13,000 people. My concert series, Shaam-e-Mehfil, has garnered tremendous interest. We’re taking it slow—so far, I’ve mostly performed covers. Once my original ghazals are released, we’ll have a robust playlist.” What’s subsequent? “My upcoming film song is in Metro… In Dino, where I’ll also appear as a band member and narrator. I also have a bank of singles—some collaborations—which I’ll release monthly during and after my US trip.”
June 18, 2025
