MUMBAI: In the August of 1997, qawwali and sufi fans lost their beloved Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, but even today his musical work continues to remain a benchmark for many in the music industry. On his 67th birthday anniversary, like many, Google also paid tribute to the legendary Pakistani singer with a special Doodle.

In the doodle, Khan’s hand replaces the letter ‘L’. Through his music career, the Pakistan-born singer performed in 40 countries, which includes playing at some prestigious events and educating the masses about this particular music genre.
Khan was the first popular Pakistani artist to cross the border and play in both, India and Pakistan. In his time, he has rendered his vocals for many Pakistani films, and a few Indian ones as well.

His Bollywood career started off only a few years before a cardiac arrest took him from the world at the age of 49. Khan, who comes from a lineage that is as old as 300 years, composed songs for two Hindi films- ‘Aur Pyaar Ho Gaya’ and ‘Kachche Dhaage’.

He also worked with Oscar-winner- AR Rahman, on his album ‘Vande Mataram’, which was released to celebrate the 50th anniversary of India’s Independence. Khan contributed to the song ‘Gurus of Peace’ which was composed by Rahman, marking the last time that the two of them worked together.

However, Rahman, who is a fan of Khan, went on to pay the Pakistani musician a lovely tribute with the song ‘Tere Bina’ for the film ‘Guru’. The love ballad was performed by Rahman, Murtuza Khan, Quadir Khan and Chinmayee, and is written by Gulzar. The track was released to commemorate Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan’s 10th death anniversary.

Apart from Rahman, Khan has collaborated with several other big names in the music world, including Pearl Jam's lead singer ‘Eddie Vedder’ for the soundtrack to ‘Dead Man Walking’ (1995), Peter Gabriel for soundtrack of ‘The Last Temptation of Christ’ (1988), and Michael Brook on the albums ‘Mustt Mustt’ (1990) and ‘Night Song’ (1996).

His disciple -Rahat Fateh Ali Khan, who is also his nephew, is yet another known face in the music fraternity and has followed in his musical footsteps, bringing the genre to more music fans around the world.