How oud reached Kuwait
Kuwait’s High Institute of Musical Art chief Mr. Bandar Ubayd says:
“This instrument reached us relatively recently,” he explains. “It was in the nineteenth century that Abdullah al-Faraj first brought one here
from India.”
Faraj, a merchant’s son, came of age in India, where he spent over 40 years as a trader. Before returning to Kuwait, he learned to sing Hindustani
ragas from local performers and picked up the oud from Yemeni émigrés in Mumbai. Faraj came home at the end of the nineteenth century, and started a
clandestine school for Kuwaiti artists. Some senior oud players in Kuwait today are pupils of pupils of Faraj’s secret students.
“This sort of influence is natural,” he says, “when a person spends a lot of time in a place and is influenced by it. Faraj brought India’s
artistic wealth back with him to Kuwait and spread it around. Much of what Khaliji music sounds like today stems directly from him.”
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