Fact File – About our National Anthem
By Menin Rodrigues
August 14, 2019 – Every year come the Independence Day of Pakistan, we get
emotional (and rightly so) about our ‘one and only’ National Anthem, and in our
enthusiasm create our own versions of the music to stake a claim and bask in its glory!
Usually, it is the ever-energetic youth of our country, our popular crooners and bands,
instrumentalists and our special-event planners who, out of exuberance introduce
various variations of the anthem to the delight of the audiences, live and virtual. It is a
credit to their patriotism that they present these versions because, indeed, each one,
sung or played, is beautiful.
So, here is my point, qualified and quantified:
This day, August 14, 2019, the 72 nd Independence Day of Pakistan, I came across
numerous versions of the anthem on the social media, as well as animated versions
presented at special events, and thought it was necessary to throw some light on facts.
To start with, this is what I wrote on some social media timelines:
All variations of our National Anthem are beautiful, BUT the real version
of the anthem can ONLY be played by a brass band – when a multitude of
instruments, EACH playing their own dedicated parts, come together in a
symphony that is second to none, globally!
It ONLY sounds CORRECT when a military brass band, of any country
(and they don’t need to know the tune) READS the notated music on the
sheets, and play the parts AS NOTATED, period. Recently, I heard the
military bands of the US, Malaysia and Turkey, play our National
Anthem, CORRECTLY – did they know the tune, NO!
So here it is, the music of our national anthem has been notated, separately, for each of
the following instruments, and when it is played together (ably conducted by a music
director in the know how of orchestral compositions) presents the symphony that
heralds our National Anthem, the way it was composed (in 1952) and supposed to have
been played – for all time’s sake!
These instruments (in a brass band ensemble of 50 musicians or more) include,
trombone (2 or 4), trumpet (up to 12), cornet (up to 4), B-flat clarinet (6-8), E-flat
clarinet (2-4), alto-saxophone (2-4), tenor-saxophone (2), French-horn (2), side-drums
(up to 12), bass-drum (one) euphonium (2) and the tuba (one)! Even the ‘Triangle’ and
the ‘Cymbal’ must know when to strike! If you take away a part of any ONE instrument,
there is no anthem, just a tune which anyone can serenade, hum or whistle!
Hope the real value and connotation of the music of our national anthem is derived from
the above information ©
Good Old Karachi 
AN ARTICLE ON THE NATIONAL ANTHEM BY ARSHAD MAHMUD (Courtesy of Dr. Salman Faridi August 18,2024)
“While an anthem is a musical work meant to be sung, it differs from a typical ‘song’. A song can be performed by a single vocalist, whereas an anthem is generally intended to be sung by a choir. Like the national anthems of many other countries, such as Germany and the USA, our national anthem is composed with all the necessary elements to be performed by a choir.
Our national anthem is written in the B-flat key, which is also a two-flat scale. The choice of this key signature was appropriate because the composer was aware that it needed to be sung by a choir, which would consist of both male and female voices. The B-flat scale (in desi terminology, the panchwan kala) is a note (sur) equally suitable for both male and female voices.
The structural form in which our national anthem is composed is referred to in technical musical terms as ‘ternary’. The ternary structure is a musical movement in three sections or parts. The first part is in the major mode, the second part is in the minor mode, and the third is once again in the major mode.
There are a few significant features that make the musical score for Pakistan’s national anthem exceptional. First, it is musically designed for four voice types — soprano, alto, tenor and bass. Second, the composition contains all the ingredients to make it sound somewhat like a hymn, because the parts written for woodwind instruments may with relative ease be sung by a choir. It is apparent when you have a closer look at the sheets of parts to be played by clarinets, namely 1st, 2nd and 3rd, that although the notes played by the three groups are different, the rhythmic structure of each bar for all three parts is identical, so in all three parts, the words for the anthem fit very well. When these three parts are sung together it becomes a hymn.
The national anthem has a unique place in the context of our musical heritage. Chagla surely deserves to be acknowledged and honoured by the conferment on him of a posthumous Nishan-i-Pakistan in the 75th year of Pakistan’s statehood.
After the approval of the musical score, it took the national anthem committee almost four years of deliberation to finalise the words. The biggest challenge for poets who were tasked to write the lyrics was to find words both suitable and meaningful which would fit well with the melodic and rhythmic structure of the approved tune.
The words written by Hafeez Jallundhri were eventually selected, and rightly so, because they fitted exceedingly well with the musical composition. Not many people know that Jallundhri, an acclaimed poet, also had a deep understanding of music. He followed the musical structure to find fitting and meaningful words, with the result that what he wrote did not fall into any conventional formulations of Urdu poetry or behers, which represent the poetic codes.
Despite deviations from traditional codes and formulations, what Jallundhri crafted was a fitting set of lyrics for Chagla’s exceptional musical composition. This is indeed remarkable work by everyone who added value to our National Anthem.
I hope that every Pakistani learns to sing our national anthem as it was originally composed by Ahmed Ghulam Ali Chagla. This recording highlights only four parts from the woodwind section of the full score, excluding the brass section and drums. Despite this, it still stands as a powerful and stirring piece of music. All my fellow citizens should take pride in this profound artistic legacy left by our elders.
Arshad Mahmud”