Faheem Abdullah, the voice behind Saiyaara and Chand Mera Dil, traces his romantic, aching sound to his Srinagar roots, where beauty and longing coexist. A self-taught poet-turned-singer, he blends Kashmiri, Urdu and English, stays rooted by singing in his mother tongue, and uses his growing platform to spotlight other Kashmiri artists while balancing indie work and film playback.
There's a certain depth in singer Faheem Abdullah's voice. Perhaps it's the ache in his melodies—that has got a lot to do with Srinagar, his hometown—that his voice feels familiar, nostalgic, as if comforting you with its warmth. He does remind you of one of those great music artists who continue to live on with their voices but one evades to liken him to a particular one.
Faheem had been gradually but firmly setting his footing in the creative industry as an independent artist— long before he became the voice for Saiyaara and Chand Mera Dil, with his music albums that were often odes to Kashmir.
In an exclusive chat, we spoke to him about his roots in Kashmir, independent music journey and films.
Excerpts:
Kashmir didn't just surround me, it raised me. I grew up self-taught — I learned by doing, by listening, by writing things down long before I could play them. The valley has this quality where beauty and longing sit right next to each other, and I think that contradiction is in everything I make. Before I was a singer I was someone scribbling poetry, telling little stories, and that came directly from where I'm from. My grounding in language and literature came later in Bangalore, but the instinct, the ache in the melodies — that's all Srinagar.
The simplest way is to keep singing in Kashmiri and writing the way I think — in Urdu, English and Kashmiri all at once, because that's honestly how my head works. But staying connected isn't only about my own songs. I want to use the platform I have now to pull other voices from the valley onto a national stage. I still work between Srinagar and Mumbai studios, and I'd like that bridge to stay open — not as nostalgia, but as a working route for the next person from home who has something to say.
Doing music for a film was never something we'd consciously chased; it wasn't even in our imagination. So no, I didn't anticipate any of this. We just believed the songs were worth giving a chance, and somehow the timing, the people and the film all aligned. I'm still catching up to it.
It's an incredibly generous comparison and I don't take it lightly — Arijit is Arijit, there's only one. But I'd be uncomfortable crowning myself anything. I'm one song into this world. I'd rather earn whatever people decide to call me over years of work than claim a title after a debut. What I can say is that I love singing music that makes people feel something, and if that keeps happening, I'm grateful. The rest isn't mine to declare.
I don't see them as rivals. Independent music is where I found my voice — total freedom, no brief, just what I want to say. Playback gave me reach I could never have built alone; a film puts your voice in front of the whole country overnight. One feeds the other. The freedom of indie makes me a better playback singer, and the audience playback brings makes more people curious about my own catalogue. I'd rather talk about what each form gives an artist than what it takes.
By treating them as two lanes I get to drive in, not a choice I have to make. The film work is happening through the T-Series partnership, and alongside it I'm building an independent album that blends Kashmiri folk with electronic textures — something that's entirely mine. As long as I'm disciplined about protecting time for my own music, I don't think I have to choose. The indie scene being this healthy actually makes that easier; there's room and appetite for both now.
I'm grateful for the image, but I don't want to be boxed by it. Romance is something I sing honestly, so I'm not going to run from it — but I'm genuinely curious about other textures. The folk-meets-electronic direction excites me, blending the sounds I grew up with against something more modern and unexpected. I'd rather keep surprising people every couple of releases than settle into one lane this early. The goal is range, not a brand.
It came from before the music — I was a poet and a storyteller first, someone writing in three languages and living half the time inside my own head. 'The Imaginary Poet' was that person: the one imagining worlds before any of them were real. I carried the name through my early years, and at some point this year it felt right to step out from behind it and just be Faheem. The poet's still there. I just don't need the mask anymore.