1988 Volume 1. Inayat Khan. "Caravanserai"

It is well known that Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan was a superb musician, but lamentably few of his compositions survive. One is the following setting of lyrics from the Fitzgerald translation of The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, which was very popular in the early part of the century. In fact, ‘The Caravanserai' was one of a series, subsequently arranged for voice and piano by a London composer, Dr. Albert Edwards, and sung by Murshid's cousin Mohammed Ali Khan, the renowned tenor. It seems these songs were part of a play based on Khayyam, either planned or actually staged by Murshid and his brothers is not clear. Most of the songs have been lost, but this one has been preserved through the musical memory of Pir-o-Murshid Musharaff Khan, who sang it by heart to Hakim van Lohuizen in 1955. Hakim made a staff notation for voice and piano at the time, which he recently revised for this publication. The melody is based on the hexatonic evening raga Kaushi Kanada, and offers a beautiful atmosphere, as well as a link with Hazrat Inayat Khan's London years.