There are guitar players, and then there are guitar players. Fareed Haque is of the later category, a virtuoso. Fareed enjoys a career that spans the spectrum of musical styles. He plays acoustic and electric guitar, sitar and even plays a hybrid guitar/sitar. The Fareed Haque Group, equipped with a DJ and a tabla player, has been described as a "tantric meditation." With diverse cultural and musical influences, Fareed Haque Group is opening new doors with a completely fresh approach to cosmic music that grooves.
Moving easily between jazz and classical guitar, Fareed's versatility has created a demand for him with prominent jazz and classical artists including Medeski, Martin and Wood, Sting, Joe Zawinul, Cassandra Wilson, Leste Bowie, Dave Holland, Robert Walter, Carl Denson, Kahil el Zabar, Defunckt, and Ramsey Lewis. Born in 1963 to Pakistani father and Chilean mother, extensive travels, especially long stays in Spain, France, Iran, Pakistan and Chile, exposed Haque to different musics from a very early age. This natural eclecticism has become the hallmark of Fareed's music.
"One of Chicago's most versatile musicians and the main man of Garaj Mahal, guitar great Fareed Haque is adept at modern jazz, Indian music, funk, jam-band rock, classical concertos -- you name it. This time he brings his cross-cultural Fareed Haque Group, a cutting-edge jazz band that's just as likely to rock or raga. Imagine "Mahavishnu Orchestra playing a dance party," he suggests." The Big Gigs, Tom Surowicz, Minneapolis Star Tribune
"A virtuoso musician who has studied both jazz and classical guitar,
Fareed Haque took his Pakistani/Chilean heritage as only a starting
point for immersing himself in an apparently limitless—and certainly
borderless—array of global music. If he has any particular preference,
it's for a variety of Miles-derived jazz-fusion that incorporates
copious measures of funk and raga. But the amazingly prolific Haque is
just as likely to be playing Latin music, composing classical
concertos, collaborating with classical orchestras, or flirting with
rock. His pursuit of wicked grooves includes leading the all-star
jazz-funk jam band Garaj Mahal. This larger Fareed Haque Group includes
drummers, tabla players, a keyboardist, and violinist, all fine jazz
musicians who also like to rock out and span the wide world with
Zappa-esque ingenuity." (City Pages A-List Pick, Rick Mason)
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