World’s first Sufi Opera Singer Saira Peter embarks on her maiden tour to Saudi Arabia

ISLAMABAD, Jan 02 (INP): British-Pakistani World’s first Sufi Opera Singer Saira Peter on her maiden tour to Saudi Arabia expressed her passion to explore Kingdom’s rich music heritage. 

In an exclusive interview with leading English-language daily Arab News (Riyadh), Saira Peter remarked on the great warmth of Saudi people and their enthusiastic response to her performances. She praised their intrinsic grasp of rhythm, performing a wide variety of songs including the Saudi National Anthem, each time drawing a burst of cheers from listeners.

During her inaugural visit of the Kingdom Saira Peter and her team were given a special tour of Tarik Abdulhakim Center (Jeddah), dedicated to composer Brig Gen Tarek Abdul Hakim (1920-2012), composer of the Saudi National Anthem. There they viewed a collection of artefacts spanning his prolific career and his unwavering mission to preserve and promote Saudi music culture globally. She also had opportunity to play the world’s first laser qanun, housed at the museum.

In Jeddah Saira Peter also visited Saudi Music Hub, where her performance for music students from Saudi National Orchestra met with rapturous applause and even some tears. She commended the young artists, acknowledging Arab music’s unique beauty with its microtones and ornamentation and admiring the nation’s rapid growth in the cultural industries. As a gesture of appreciation for her skill, internationally renowned Saudi majas singer Mohamed Radi Alsharif (Saudi National Orchestra) performed a majas especially for Saira Peter and her team. 

The London-based singer is the director of NJ Arts (Noor Jehan Arts) London, opened by global megastar Sir Cliff Richard OBE, who remained patron until his retirement. There she also trains vocalists and has starred on many stages across the globe including Pakistan, often performing with her husband, musician Stephen Smith.

British soprano Saira Peter lives in London. She has performed internationally, singing in seventeen languages, and is trained in eastern and western classical music. An academic background in the sciences provided her with a scientific approach to the skill of singing. Her subsequent MA in History from Queen Mary, University of London brought her to an awareness of the transformational power of celebration to bring together diverse communities, as seen in the Iberian Peninsula under Arab rule and elsewhere. She became convinced that the Arts can promote social cohesion in our fractured world.

More recently Saira Peter has taken her biggest step toward connecting the two great traditions of opera and sufi music. She is currently working on the world’s first Sufi-Opera® production, Marvi’s Tears, with Opera Director Jonny Danciger MA (Oxon) (Mozart’s The Marriage of Figaro; Leonard Bernstein’s Candide; Puccini’s Tosca.), Composer Paul Knight (Macbeth; Christmas Carol; Treasure Island; Much Ado About Nothing.) and British Librettist Zafar Francis MA PGDip (London). The work is specially created for her in the role of the heroine, Marvi.

Marvi’s Tears is based on a story by renowned sufi poet, Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai.  Marvi is one of Latif’s seven heroines, who through her bravery, saves her village, securing justice and peace throughout her nation. The story’s themes of harmony, women’s leadership and consequent social transformation deal with contemporary issues facing the modern world.

For the first time, Marvi’s Tears puts Latif’s story on stage in English, through an exciting new fusion of western opera and eastern classical music, for a global audience.