Who is Maulvi Ahmed Hassan Akhter Hassan Vehranwale Qawwal?
Maulvi Ahmed Hassan Akhter Hassan Vehranwale Qawwal is a South Asian classical music artist known for Qawwali, Vocal. Stream 1 recording on Saarey Music.
The family of Maulvi Ahmed Hassan Akhter Hassan Vehranwale Qawwal belonged to the village of ‘Vehraan’ near Jalandhar. The appellation ‘Maulvi’ before their names is a testament to the fact that the family was originally involved in preaching the teachings of Islam. The first Qawwal in their family was one Phool Khan who performed Qawwali in the late 15th century, however, the family reverted to preaching before turning back to Qawwali in the late 19th century under the instructions of their spiritual master or Pir, Maulana Abdul Qadir Raipuri. The Maulvis of Vehran have given rise to two different but related Qawwali parties, the party of Baba Ghulam Kibriya Qawwal (1952 – 2003), and the main ‘Vehranwale Qawwal’ party. Both these groups practiced a style heavily influenced by the traditional Punjabi rural and folk music as performed in the ‘do-aba’ region, with relatively little influence of the khayal and dhrupad styles in evidence amongst the other Qawwal groups of the time.
The first major 20th-century Qawwals of the party were the four brothers Maulvi Ahmed Hussain (1914-1979), Maulvi Ahmed Hassan (1920 – 1968), Maulvi Hussain Ahmed, and Maulvi Muhammad Mohsin. They started performing Qawwali in the 1940s and developed a local reputation before migrating to the village of ‘Mai Di Jhuggi’ near modern-day Faisalabad in Pakistan. The party performed till the 1960s, before being taken over by the next generation of Qawwals, namely Maulvi Akhter Hassan (1951 – 1983), Maulvi Haider Hassan (1954 – 2021), Maulvi Zahid Hassan, and Maulvi Zameer Hassan. The two elder members of the party, Maulvi Ahmed Hussain and Maulvi Muhammad Mohsin kept performing with their children and their nephews till their deaths, and can be seen in some of the videos of the party recorded in the 1970s. After the death of Maulvi Akhter Hassan, the party was led by Maulvi Haider Hassan, accompanied by Zameer Hassan. Currently, Maulvi Zameer Hassan heads the family qawwali party, accompanied by Maulvi Haider Hassan’s young son, Ali Haider.
