By ROD NORDLAND and FATIMA FAIZI
Aryana Saeed, an Afghan singer, performing in Kabul on Saturday after her concert at Ghazi Stadium on Friday was canceled PHOTO/Massoud Hossaini/Associated Press
The Afghan singer and pop star Aryana Saeed, as famous here for her curve-hugging costumes as she is for her feminist lyrics, can sell out any stadium in Afghanistan, and in many other countries as well. When it comes to her home country, though, that does not necessarily mean she can perform in them.
Ms. Saeed’s latest concert in Afghanistan was to be held in Ghazi Stadium in Kabul on Friday, and despite heavy security and secrecy until just before the event, all 30,000 tickets sold quickly at hefty prices, according to Ms. Saeed’s manager.
She chose the date, she said, because it was the eve of Afghanistan’s independence day, and she wanted to highlight that Afghan women were still not free 98 years later. She chose the stadium because it was a place made notorious by Taliban executions of women in the late 1990s.
“I wanted to put a smile on people’s faces in the place where the Taliban executed people,” she said in an interview.
As soon as word about the concert got out, though, the mullahs denounced it and the authorities canceled it.
“I’ll perform in the street if I have to,” Ms. Saeed said. “The mullahs are the enemy of the Afghan people, the enemy of happiness.”
Ms. Saeed, 32, has long been a sensation here. She refuses to wear a head scarf, except when trying to protect her identity in a city where she is instantly recognizable and quickly draws a crowd. For security reasons, she lives in London with her mother and sisters, usually returning to Afghanistan only to perform.
Her music is a combination of traditional and folk songs, rendered as Afghan pop, overlaid occasionally with a bit of hip-hop. She sings in both Dari and Pashto, the country’s two main languages.
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