Usman Riaz honors Junoon with Saeen

Usman Riaz nails Junoon’s Saeen

The first time we saw the young Usman Riaz with his swift guitar works and imposing command over the piano, was when he made his alliance with Ali Noor during the premier season of Ufone’s famed, Uth Records, soon after which the 20 year old Karachiite grew into earning the reputation of Pakistan’s youngest guitar prodigy, especially after the release of his mega-hit single ‘Fire Fly’ – which went viral on YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter.

As part of his recent projects, Usman was given the honour to be part of Junoon’s 20^th anniversary album, for which the young maestro recorded an instrumental cover of the band’s mammoth hit song, ‘Saeen’.

However, before we look into how this budding legend ‘nailed’ the assignment, for those who don’t know who Usman Riaz is, then here it is.

Hailing from Karachi, Usman initially picked up his passion for music when he started playing classical piano at a tender age of 6, and later on, with more appreciation and love for melody, he added some exceptional skills on the guitar when he was 16.

However, Usman’s love for music also comes since he is blessed with a family full of creative and talented people. He is the grandnephew of Zia Mohyeddin, while his great grandfather was an Eastern music scholar who wrote many books on music theory.

As for his collaboration for Junoon, Usman was approached through an email by the band’s former lead guitarist Salman Ahmad, asking the 20 year to be part of the commemoration.

In a recent interview with the Express Tribune Usman said, “I was thrilled and honoured. Here is an established musician who feels I’m good enough. I’m not really concerned about fame or recognition but being allowed to recreate Junoon’s music is what I’m grateful for.”

However, the best part about all this was how Usman executed the whole task and interpreted Junoon’s one of the best signature melodies in his own style, harmonizing the whole project with the use of a guitar, Mandolin, Tanpura, piano, harmonium, ceramic drums and shakers.

Throughout his imposing composition, Usman has retained the original, haunting and spiritual melody of the whole song, which comes alive with the Tanpura and harmonium, all of which shift into the main tune of Saeen with the aid of his fast picks on the guitar, all harmonised with the back ground drums and piano.

Since its release earlier this month, the song has already done exceptionally well and Usman has surely come up to the task, making a worthy place for his hit on Junoon’s 20^th anniversary album.

Posted by Sehl Bin Shoaib on Oct 18 2011. Filed under Entertainment. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry