Fattokhon Mamadaliev

Fattokhon Mamadaliev was born on 25 August 1923 in the Baliqchi district of the Andijan region, into a peasant family. From an early age he was drawn to singing and to instruments: he played the ghijjak, the tanbur and the dutar. He learned the ashula, the “great ashula” and the paths of maqom from teachers including Jurakhon Sultonov, Umrzaq Pahlavon Saydali, the instrument maker Ruzimatkhon Isaboev, Abdulla Taraz and Yunus Rajabi.

From 1944 to 1960 he worked as an instrumentalist and singer in various theatres of the Andijan region. He graduated from the Andijan Pedagogical Institute in 1960 and taught there until 1967. In the late 1960s he founded and directed a maqom ensemble at Andijan’s City House of Culture No. 2, and he set up similar groups in the Khojaobod and Izboskan districts.

From 1983 he was a vocalist with the Uzbek State Philharmonic, from 1984 a teacher at the Tashkent State Conservatory, and from 1992 a professor. There he trained a new generation of performers in traditional singing.

His voice was clear and soulful, with a wide range and long breath, and in his performances poetry and melody formed a single whole. His repertoire included the Fergana–Tashkent maqom paths, sections of the Shashmaqom, and the ashula and great ashula. He set more than fifty ghazals by classical and modern poets to music, composed the five-part cycle “Savti Fattokhon”, and revived the maqom paths “Qadimgi Ushshoq”, “Umrzaq Pahlavon Ushshoqi” and “Zikri Ushshoqi”.

In 1990 he received the title People’s Hafiz of the Uzbek SSR; in the years of independence he was awarded the Order “Mehnat shuhrati” and, in 1998, the Order “El-yurt hurmati”. Mamadaliev died in Tashkent on 3 April 1999 and was buried in the Baliqchi district. In 2021 a maqom evening in his memory was held in Kokand.