Zahir Howaida

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Zahir Howaida (also Huwaida ; Persian ظاهر هويدا; * February 28, 1945 in Daikondi in the Hazara region in central Afghanistan ; † March 5, 2012 in Hamburg ) was an Afghan singer , news anchor and presenter at RTA , songwriter, poet and film actor.

Live and act

Howaida's father, an employee, was transferred from Kabul to Mazar-i Sharif . There Zahir Howaida attended the Sultan Ghiasuddin Primary School for some time until his father died at the age of 33 and the family returned to Kabul. Howaida's mother worked as a seamstress; Zahir, in order to be able to support the family, as a kind of apprentice to various craftsmen. He also attended the Isteqlal Lycee in Kabul. According to his own statements in an interview in Kabul's RTA, he often stayed away from school in high school without excuse to read books, especially about literature, in the Kabul State Library.

When he was 5 years old, his father hired a music teacher for him and his brother Kabir to educate him in music. In doing so, he learned the basic instruments of the Indo-Iranian culture, in particular the Indian harmonium . In the music school in Kabul he was confronted with western musical instruments, the musical form of polyphony and harmony. With Aziz Ashna he founded a music band called "Orchester der Amateure"; his brother Kabir Howaida played the piano in it.

In the 1960s, Zahir Howaida worked as a newscaster on Afghan Radio (RTA). In 1966 he traveled to Moscow with Babrak Wassa to study at the Tchaikovsky Conservatory there.

The high point of his career was in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Howaida, a contemporary of Ahmad Zahir , was involved in around 300 songs as a composer and singer and acted as a role model for younger generations. In 1972 he traveled to Tehran . With his song Kamar barik-e man , which he also sang with well-known Iranian singers, he became known throughout the Persian-speaking area, as it was also played by radio and TV stations in Iran and Tajikistan ; Afghanistan only got a television channel in 1978. Until 1979 his songs were sung in Iran and by Iranian singers abroad. B. by Leila Forouhar and Faramarz Assef. Howaida appeared in various roles on theater stages and in radio plays on Afghan radio.

Zahir Howaida sang folk and love songs as well as more ambitious poems from Persian literature, such as by Jalal ad-Din ar-Rumi . On various occasions he expressed his dismay with songs, for example about the wave of refugees after the occupation of the country by the Soviet Union. Almost all of his songs are in the Persian language, which the regime of Zahir Shah renamed Dari in 1965 . When asked by his Pashtun friends to sing at least one song in Pashto , Howaida joked that he would sing in Pashto “as soon as Awalmir sings a song in Persian”. In fact, Howaida later sang a Pashto song, although Awalmir never sang on Dari. Kamar barik-e man is originally a unanimous folk song from the Badachshan province , which Howaida sang with several voices according to the theory of harmony.

In 1989 Howaida emigrated to India, where he stayed for two years. He has lived in Hamburg since 1991. His five children, three sons and two daughters, are just as musical. His son Arash Howaida became a pop singer in Hamburg.

Zahir Howaida, who starred in the two films Nan ("Bread") and Professor , died in 2012 of a serious illness. He was buried on March 10, 2012 in a Hamburg cemetery. Well-known artists and singers from all over the world attended his funeral.

Discography

Publications in exile:

• Az Dil-e-Man
• Mo Tellae
• Dokane rank

Individual evidence

1. ↑ www.bbc.co.uk
2. ↑ http://database-aryana-encyclopaedia.blogspot.com/2009/11/blog-post_9510.html
3. ↑ http://www.bbc.co.uk/persian/afghanistan/2012/03/120309_l93_zaher_hoveida_funeral.shtml