Fez — Sanam Marvi closed the third day of the Fez Festival of World Sacred Music with a late-night Sufi performance at Jnan Sbil, turning the garden into a space of stillness, longing, and spiritual surrender.
The day had already moved through several worlds. It opened at Dar Adiyel with “Saisons du monde intérieur – Ragas & Tagore,” led by Pandit Shyam Sundar Goswami, before shifting into “Incarnation,” the Khmer sacred dance performance shaped by Chap Chamroeunmina and sound creator Mathias Delplanque.
By early evening, Jnan Sbil hosted the up-and-coming jazz virtuoso Léon Phal’s “Stress Killer,” where the Franco-Swiss saxophonist brought jazz, groove, and improvisation into the garden. The program then moved to Bab Makina for Sami Yusuf’s highly anticipated concert, one of the night’s largest and most magnetic moments.
Marvi’s 11 p.m. concert came after that scale and spectacle, but it carried equal force in another register. Her show was smaller in size than Sami Yusuf’s Bab Makina performance, yet it was just as powerful in emotional weight.
A voice that went straight to the heart
Marvi’s voice carried the kind of directness Sufi music is meant to seek. Her singing moved through longing, devotion, separation, and the hope of union with the beloved, the master, or the divine.
Marvi is one of the great voices of Indo-Pakistani Sufi tradition, rooted in Sindh and deeply tied to “Sama,” the practice of spiritual listening. Her performance also drew on the Sufi idea of ecstatic search, where poetry and repetition open the path toward “wajd,” or spiritual transport.
Jnan Sbil was packed despite the late hour. The crowd stayed with her, visibly enchanted by the grace of her presence and the precision of her band.
The garden seemed to soften around the music, letting the voice rise through the trees and sound of water founds in the background to settle over the audience.
