The Music of Pakistan includes diverse elements ranging from music from various parts of South Asia as well as Central Asian, Middle Eastern, and modern-day Western popular music influences. With these multiple influences, a distinctive Pakistani music has emerged.
Indian pop music, also known as Indi-pop, refers to pop music produced in India that is independent from filmi soundtracks for Indian cinema. Indian pop is closely linked to Bollywood, Kollywood, Tollywood and the Asian Underground scene of the United Kingdom. The variety of South Asian music from different countries are generally known as Desi music.
Nazia and Zoheb were a Pakistani pop duo from Karachi, Sindh formed in 1980. The group consisted of two siblings, Nazia Hassan and Zoheb Hassan, who were a singing sensation and pop icons across South Asia. They are regarded as pioneers of the Pakistani pop scenes, and were one of the most successful Asian pop duos of all time, selling more than 105 million albums worldwide.
Biddu Appaiah is a British-Indian singer-songwriter, composer, and music producer who composed and produced many worldwide hit records during a career spanning five decades. Considered one of the pioneers of disco, Euro disco, and Indian pop, he has sold millions of records worldwide, and has received an Ivor Novello award for his work. He has been ranked at number 34 on NME's "The 50 Greatest Producers Ever" list.
Shyamalal Babu Rai, known professionally as Indeevar, was one of the leading Hindi film lyricists in the 1960s.
Nazia Hassan was a Pakistani singer-songwriter, lawyer and social activist. Referred to as the Queen of South Asian pop, she is considered one of the most influential singers in the subcontinent. Starting in the 1980s, as part of the duo Nazia and Zoheb, she and her brother Zoheb Hassan, have sold over 65 million records worldwide.
Zoheb Hassan is a Pakistani pop icon, singer, songwriter, producer, and was a part of the superduo Nazia and Zoheb.
Pakistani popular music or shortly Pakistani pop music refers to popular music forms in Pakistan. Pakistani pop is a mixture of traditional Pakistani classical music and western influences of jazz, rock and roll, hip hop and disco sung in various languages of Pakistan, including Urdu. The popularity of music is based on the individual sales of a single, viewership of its music video or the singer's album chart positions. Apart from within Pakistan, Pakistani pop music has also achieved an influential following and popularity in neighboring countries and is listened by members of the Pakistani diaspora, especially in the Middle East, Europe and North America.
Disco Deewane is a 1981 Pakistani pop album released by Pakistani singer Nazia Hassan. The music was composed by Indian-British music director Biddu who also produced it under the label of HMV India/Saregama. It charted in fourteen countries worldwide and became the best-selling Asian pop record to-date. The debut album led Nazia Hasan to overnight fame. It changed trends in music across South Asia, where it broke sales records. In India, it sold 100,000 records within a day of its release in Mumbai alone, went Platinum within three weeks, and went Double-Platinum soon after.
Star/Boom Boom is the second studio album by Pakistani pop duo Nazia and Zoheb, released in 1982. The Bollywood film Star used the album's music as its soundtrack. The album was thus also released as Star, a Bollywood music soundtrack album. The album featured music composed by British-Indian producer Biddu.
Young Tarang is the third studio album by the Pakistani pop duo Nazia and Zoheb, consisting of Nazia Hassan and Zoheb Hassan. The music was composed by Zoheb and British-Indian producer Biddu, with lyrics written by Nazia and Zoheb.
Hotline was the fourth studio album from the Pakistani pop duo of Nazia and Zoheb, released in 1987. It was produced by the Indian producer Biddu. Along with several other albums from Biddu and the Hassan duo, its success in India contributed to the creation of the Indi-pop market. It was also released in the United Kingdom in 1987. It was the best-selling album of the duo after Disco Deewane.
Music '89 was the first ever all pop music stage-show to be aired on Pakistan TV.
Star is a 1982 Indian Bollywood movie, directed by Vinod Pande, starring Kumar Gaurav, Rati Agnihotri, Raj Kiran, Saeed Jaffrey, A.K. Hangal, Dina Pathak and Padmini Kolhapure.
"Aap Jaisa Koi" is a song from the soundtrack of the 1980 Bollywood film Qurbani. It was the debut song of Pakistani singer Nazia Hassan, and was composed by British Indian producer Biddu. The song was featured in the film as an item number, picturised on Zeenat Aman. It has been remixed and sampled by many other artists.
Strings was a Pakistani pop/rock band composed of two members, plus four live band members from Karachi, Pakistan. The band was initially formed by four college students—Bilal Maqsood, Faisal Kapadia (vocals), Rafiq Wazir Ali (synthesizer) and Kareem Bashir Bhoy —in 1988. In 1992 the quartet disbanded, only to make a comeback with Maqsood and Kapadia in 2000. While the initial band rode the new wave of Pakistani pop music, the later lineup ushered a revival in the Pakistani music industry.
Sabir Zafar is a leading poet and lyricist in Pakistan. He has written songs for many Pakistani films, singers such as Nazia Hasan, Sajjad Ali, Ali Azmat and his band Junoon, as well as many successful TV drama serials. He was awarded a Tamgha-e-Imtiaz by the Government of Pakistan in 2010.
Disco Se Aagay is a 1984 British new wave album by the British Pakistani sister-brother duo Nermin Niazi and Feisal Mosleh. The only album that they produced and released, it initially received relatively little notice at release. However, its remaster and re-release by the record label Discostan in 2021 caused it to gain more mainstream attention for combining British new wave, synthpop and disco with Urdu lyrics and Hindustani music as well as the background and experiences of the artists as British Pakistanis.
