The styles vary but what’s unvarying is the fundamentalist fanatics’ denunciation of all this music. Strike a blow against repression and play this CD. This heterogeneous folk music of Afghanistan, sung in Dari, encompasses styles and influences from the tribal music of Afghanistan’s provinces to Arabian ghazals to Pakistani qawwalis to just a bit of the Persian music of Iran. Vocals, harmonium, drums, and lutes predominate. The songs are sometimes melancholy, sometimes celebratory, always with an undercurrent of devotion (though whether to lovers or Allah remains unstated), and always beautiful and keening in that way that Persian and qawwali music are. To the producers’ credit, they explain that the translated versions of the lyrics appear trite and mundane while the same words in their native language are quite poetic and evocative on several levels. Not that that’ll be an issue for your show.

1. Catchy and lively
2. Stately slow, an atypical ghazal
3. Slow, pensive
4. A veritable pop tune, a love song, with both male and female verses
5. Song of longing for lost one, literally “sun””, poetically … probably lover
6. A swinging folk song about a nomad girl
7. Strictly religious praise, pretty tune
8. Soaring melody
9. From the notes: this “traditional song has almost become a national anthem in Afghanistan. It expresses the desire to do a pilgrimage to Mazar-e-Sharif, and tells about the beauty of the nature along the way.” So think of it as the Afghan analogue of “America (The Beautiful)” and consider the romanticism inherent in all such patriotic songs celebrating the wonders of the mother/father/homeland.
10. Slow, sad song
11. An upbeat vocal duet extolling the the beautiful girls of Kabul; “I would die for a glimpse of the jewels behind your veil / You are like a flower, your neck so pale”; Oh, pale-necked flower in the burqa …
12. Harmonium and drum give this a very Indo-Pakistani flavor while the melody is utterly captivating