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The finalists for the celebrated Aga Khan Music Awards (AKMA) 2025 are out, featuring artists from across the globe. Among them are three Pakistanis: Juman Latif, Ustad Noor Bakhsh, and Ustad Naseeruddin Saami, as well as Kamilya Jubran from Palestine.

The ceremony announcing the winner will be held on November 22 at the Southbank Centre across the Royal Festival Hall, Queen Elizabeth Hall and The Purcell Room. The awards recognise and celebrate the immense diversity of music in societies across the world in which Muslims have a significant presence. The AKMA are open to everyone, and the nominees need not be Muslims.

The awards advance pluralism, tolerance, and global understanding through music at a time when there is much conflict and fragmentation in the world. They honour outstanding musicians and artists whose work preserves, revives, and reimagines devotional music and poetry, indigenous classical music, traditional folk music, and tradition-inspired contemporary music that has flourished in cultures shaped by Islam.

In that regard, Pakistan’s Ustaad Saami, Ustad Bakhsh, and Latif are fitting candidates. Ustad Saami is a master of Khayal singing and the leading representative of the oldest tabla gharanas, the Delhi Gharana of music. He is celebrated for being the only living practitioner of the 49-microtonal Surti scale, and is highly regarded for his pitch precision and long lineage of oral tradition.

Ustad Bakhsh, from the Makran Coast in Balochistan, is a virtuoso of the benju. Though living in relative remoteness, he has brought his experimental, deeply rooted music to global attention via recordings, live performances, and his album Jingul. Latif, often known simply as “Fakir Juman”, is a Sufi singer and educator from Sindh, devoted to the teaching and performance of Shah Abdul Latif Bhittai’s raags, preserving the tradition through his school in Bhit Shah and international performances. His work spans both maintaining ritual and devotional practice and bringing these Sufi forms to broader audiences.

Other finalists hail from diverse musical traditions and geographies, including Senny Camara (Senegal), Mohi Bahauddin Dagar (India), Hamid El Kasri (Morocco), Ghalia Benali (Tunisia), Derya Turkan (Turkey), Farah Kaddour (Lebanon), and Mamadou Diabaté (Burkina Faso), among others.

This year’s winners selected by the Awards Master Jury will be announced on November 4 and honoured at an award ceremony on November 22 at London’s Southbank Centre. The ceremony will be the centrepiece of four days of events from November 20 to 23.

The winners will share a prize fund of $500,000 and gain access to professional opportunities such as commissions, recordings, management contracts, and support for educational and preservation initiatives.

The winners are chosen by an independent master jury appointed by the awards co-chairs. The jurors are drawn from eminent performers, composers, festival directors, music scholars, and arts education leaders. The number of awardees and the specific domains of activity in which awards are made are determined by the master jury for each awards cycle.

No one directly associated with the Aga Khan’s institutions is eligible for consideration.

The 2025 iteration of the awards is held under the patronage of Prince Rahim Aga Khan V, alongside his uncle, Prince Amyn Aga Khan. The new chapter reflects both continuity and remembrance, honouring the legacy of the awards’ founder and chair, the late Prince Karim Aga Khan IV, whose deep belief in the power of music to connect, uplift, and transcend continues to inspire the awards’ spirit.

Past winners include Pakistan’s Zarsanga, revered as the Queen of Pashtun Folklore for her lifelong commitment to traditional Pashto music, and Sain Zahoor, a distinguished Punjabi Sufi musician recognised for his soulful performances of devotional poetry.

Here is the complete list of 22 finalists:

Qalali Folk Band (Bahrain)

Kamilya Jubran (Palestine)

Kyriakos Kalaidzidis (Greece)

Derya Turkan (Turkey)

Senny Camara (Senegal)

Farah Kaddour (Lebanon)

Hamid El Kasri (Morocco)

Sahba Aminikia (Iran/Usa)

Mamadou Diabaté (Burkina Faso)

Ghalia Benali (Tunisia)

Juman Latif (Pakistan)

Ali Kazemi (Iran)

Ustad Noor Bakhsh (Pakistan)

Layth Sidiq (Jordan)

Mariam Bagayoko (Mali)

Es’hak Baluch Nasab (Iran)

Mohi Bahauddin Dagar (India)

Egyptian Center for Culture and Arts Makan (Egypt)

Hayaf Yassine (Lebanon)

Rihab Azar (Syria)

Naseer and Nazeer Ahmed Khan Warsi (India)

Ustad Naseeruddin Saami (Pakistan)