Azeem Prem Ragi

Azim Prem Ragi was one of the seminal Qawwals of the first half of the 20th Century. Born in Agra to a family of traders, Azim Prem Ragi was initially a devotee of the Naqshbandi saints Subhan Shah and Mastan Shah of Philibhat. Along with Ali Bakhsh Waiz Qawwal of Hyderabad, Azim Prem Ragi was the first Qawwal who brought a touch of the traditional ‘Khanqahi’ Qawwali into the recorded Qawwali repertoire. He was a self-taught musician and poet who began writing and performing Qawwali at the shrines of Chishti sufi saints in Delhi and Ajmer. He was awarded the title of ‘Prem Ragi’ by Khwaja Hasan Nizami, a prominent Sufi and writer of the first half of the 20th Century. Azim Prem Ragi remained a prolific recording artist from the 1930s till his death, and was a regular performer on All India Radio and later, on Radio Pakistan. He rarely sang kalaams of traditional Sufi poets, instead composing and performing his own pieces. After the partition of the subcontinent, Azim Prem Ragi settled in Karachi and continued performing in mehfils and shrines, while regularly being featured on Radio Pakistan. He trained his son Fiza Moin as a Qawwal, and his younger son Saleem Shehzad as a light-classical singer. Both his sons continued performing for many decades after Azim Prem Ragi’s death.