(b Kabul, 1947). Afghan singer. Born with the name Ferīda, she came from a religious background. Her father, Mohammad Ayūb, was a shopkeeper, her mother a Qur'anic teacher in a secondary school. She became a typist and secretary and was employed for some time in this capacity at Radio Afghanistan. In 1967 she started singing on Radio Afghanistan under the stage name Mahwash, by which she is generally known. She soon became an extremely popular radio artist; in 1971 the radio audience voted her outstanding singer of the year. As a fully professional singer she was much in demand for élite wedding parties in Kabul.
A number of songwriters composed material for her, including Ustād Nabi Gol, Hafīzullah Khyāl, Madadi and Ustād Hāshem, who gave her some training in classical singing. In 1977 she was given the title of Ustād by the Minister of Information and Culture. Many Afghan cognoscenti felt this was inappropriate, if only because this title is never applied to women. In 1991 Mahwash left Afghanistan, and was in due course given asylum in the USA. She settled in California and continued her career as a singer in the USA and Europe. Her success owed much to the business acumen of her husband Fārūq who sat on stage with her during performances, reading requests from the audience and finding the appropriate texts in hand-written songbooks.
ABDUL-WAHAB MADADI (with JOHN BAILY)