Quraishi

Quraishi is an Afghan rubab player and self-taught instrumentalist from Kabul. He grows out of a family line that includes musicians and instrument makers, and his father makes his first rubab for him. The rubab is a short-necked lute associated with Afghan music, and Quraishi works within its traditional repertoire and sound world.

Background and musical training

While growing up in Kabul, Quraishi learns the folk styles and regional genres associated with Pashtu, Uzbek and Tajik communities. He also studies the formal principles of Hindustani classical music theory, which underpin Afghan art music. His playing reflects a broad Afghan musical tradition that connects court music, radio-era performance and contemporary immigrant communities.

Style and instrumentation

Quraishi performs without electronic effects, focusing on rubab technique, rhythm and melody. The rubab he plays belongs to the short-necked lute family and is traditionally carved from a single piece of mulberry wood with a skin face, often decorated with bone, ivory, lapis lazuli or mother of pearl. It usually has three melody strings and up to twenty sympathetic strings, giving it a resonant sound. On recording, he is joined by drummer Chatram Sahni, who plays the dhol, a tunable double-headed Afghani drum made from mulberry wood with goat skin stretched over both ends.

Recording repertoire

On Pure & True Rubab, Quraishi performs classical pieces including “Herati,” “Valley,” “Badakshi,” “Qalin,” “Jani-ba-Lab” and “Ashoqi,” alongside original compositions such as “Meg” and “Hope.” The album presents duet interplay between rubab and dhol, moving between dance rhythms, call-and-response passages and more meditative, Sufi-influenced phrasing.

Musical context

His music is placed within the wider history of Afghan instrumental performance, shaped by the country’s regional traditions and by influences that reach from Indian ragas to pentatonic melodic patterns and other neighbouring musical languages. Quraishi’s performances are presented as a link between Afghan classical court music, the golden years of Afghan radio and the present-day tradition of Afghan musicians working in diaspora.