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For a country that shares a rich heritage of music with the Subcontinent, Pakistan has seen its fair share of threats to the existence of music in the country. Now, exploring and analysing exactly this phenomena of ‘dying’ music and culture is Indus Blues.

In its recently-released trailer, the documentary looks at the different forms of music and rhythm of this soil, and where they originate from as the mighty Indus roars and serpentines through the country. However, what’s more important in the narrative is that it manages to talk about the open threats from politics and fundamentalism, of which, music faces the brunt. In this regard, the film looks at nine instruments and eleven musicians, which may cease to exist soon.

The documentary, which was earlier nominated for the Best Documentary category at Regina International Film Festival and Guam International Film Festival, is directed by UCLA alumnus Jawad Sharif and written by Haroon Riaz, along with creative production by musician Arieb Azhar.

While there’s uncertainty if things in the country will change and a preservation of our heritage will become a top priority, the trailer does point perhaps towards a hope that the countless connoisseurs of music in the country might just realize how dreary the situation really is.

Check out the trailer for Indus Blues here:

Shahjehan Saleem

The author is Contributing Editor at Something Haute as well as a professor in the Media Sciences department at SZABIST, Karachi. Socio-cultural theories and geography fill up the rest of his time.