“I am a Moslem and I am a Sufi. Sufis have converted millions of people to Islam and this, thanks to music. The great Sufi saints like Nizamuddin introduced Sufism in India. My father Ustad Fateh Alî Khan belongs to this lineage. My father was so involved in his music, that after having sung, he could be in tears for several days, without speaking to anyone. A recited text will not have the same effects as the same text sung. If the poem is not sung, it remains in the book and cannot get out. And I sing, because I learnt this from my great ancestors.”

(Ausschnitt aus einem Interview mit dem 1997 verstorbenen Nusrat Fateh Alî Khan anlässlich eines Konzerts in Paris, 1988)