Malaysia’s rich music culture part 8: Raihan and a new awareness

Music as identity

As Malay culture became much more influenced by Islamic identity, many facets of Malay society started changing.

There was some conjecture within the Muslim Ummah that music was prohibited. The mega-star Cat Stevens, who renamed himself Yusuf Islam, after his conversion to Islam quit the pop music business, but later started recording nasheed in 1987. Nasheed is pure vocal music, which is partially coincident with hymns, usually sung as cappella, within a traditional Islamic format.

The nasheed group Raihan, originally composed of five members became famous in Malaysia around the mid 1990s, a time when Islam was becoming a deep aspect of the Malay youth-psych.

Their first album Puji-Pujian sold more than 3,500,000 copies world-wide in 1996.

The late Queen Elizabeth II invited Raihan to perform at a Royal Gala performance, in conjunction with the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting in Edinburgh in 1997. They also performed at the closing ceremony at the 1998 Commonwealth Games in Kuala Lumpur. The Queen even attended a recording session by the group in Kuala Lumpur.

They undertook a number of world tours to the UK, where they performed in the Royal Albert Hall, France, Canada, Australia, Indonesia, Ireland, Kuwait, Russia, Singapore, China, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Thailand, and the United States. Raihan went on to record two songs with Yusuf Islam in their second album Syukur.

The success of Raihan led to the formation of a number of nasheed groups in Malaysia over the decade, some being more successful than others. Nasheed nights and competitions became a familiar aspect within public universities, schools, and even the civil service. Raihan helped to shape a section of Malay music that reflected a new awareness.

The rise of Raihan and popularity of Nasheed came at a time when Malay culture was undergoing changes. Raihan also extolled the moderate nature of Malaysian Islam to the world, as Mahathir’s administration at the time was trying to project to the world. From a commercial point of view, Raihan demonstrated the massive size of a yet to be defined mass-Muslim global consumer market.