Habib Wahid: Multi-cultural, transnational music production

Habib Wahid is a successful musician whose album has sold approximately 1.5 million copies. He is also a return migrant from England where he studied at the London School of Audio Engineering.

I completed my studies in music production at the London School of Audio Engineering in the UK. When I was studying there, I got to know a lot of people, especially British born Bangladeshis. I got together with a couple of people including Kaya and Helal the singers on my album. What really amazed me was that even those people who were born and brought up in England showed a strong connection with the folk music of Bangladesh – music that we listen to in the villages and not in urban areas. I was also surprised because when I was in Bangladesh I knew a lot of musicians and even they were not so attached to this folk music. The attachment that Kaya and Helal had was amazing.

We just thought that we could do something together. I basically encouraged them and said that if you do something here I can take it back with me and see what happens. I did exactly this, I came back and released an album and within six months had sold 100,000 copies. I noticed that British Bangladeshis, especially those between the age group 15-20, bought these CDs. I felt they had some questions with regard to their own identities. They did not think of themselves as pure Bangladeshis, nor did they consider themselves pure British citizens, I reckon they stood somewhere in between. They were heavily confused as to what to do. On the one hand the folk music of our country touched them; on the other hand they were heavily influenced by the mainstream British music. These people appreciated my music.

When the album was released I went to the UK again, and along with my British Bangladeshi friends we did a lot of performances in various places. I started getting phone calls from all over the UK inviting us to perform. Different composers were asking us to collaborate and this gave us a lot of courage.

With attention and support I believe that our music has got the capacity of drawing an international audience. What is needed is a lot of support from the government or from those with power. In Bangladesh there are quite a few private Universities that are offering new subjects. I believe music production and audio engineering may also be subjects for these universities to offer. Audio engineering is an area that has demand in the burgeoning music industry all over the world. I firmly believe that we will see a very different Bangladesh 5-10 years from now.

So obviously, what I feel, is that doing something as a team is important in order to develop the music, to take it further and to actually bind the citizens of the two countries. One of the things that needs to happen is more interaction between the musicians and composers who live in Bangladesh and those who live in the UK.