As the successful Pop-Folk-Poet Cat Stevens converted suddenly to Islam, scraped his Fans, questioning the head. Then he got into musical oblivion – until he dug up “again”.
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Yusuf/Cat Stevens is 70
Morning has broken…
At the beginning of the 1970s Cat Stevens starts a great career as a Humorous Poet. His soft voice and the gentle songs of the late flowers children will be enchanted up in the 1980s. Songs like “Peace Train” fit-for-peace movement, “My Lady D’Arbanville” and “Father And Son” camp-fire classics. Also his songs from the Soundtrack to the cult film “Harold and Maude” are unforgettable.
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Yusuf/Cat Stevens is 70
A new life
At the end of the 70’s circuit with Cat Stevens and music. He is called now Yusuf Islam and preaching his new Faith. The, not everybody’s understanding. Attention he excited, as he appears to support the Fatwa against Salman Rushdie. So he says in an Interview that if Rushdie showed up with him, he wanted to try”, Ayatollah Khomeini, to call and tell him where the man is”.
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Yusuf/Cat Stevens is 70
Peace preacher
He denied to assist with this sentence, the Fatwa, but manages to clear up the accusations out of the way. So, he advocates vehemently that Islam is considered a peaceful Religion. He is involved in aid projects in Kosovo or in Iraq, but also in his home town of London. So, he founded, alongside other Muslim schools in London in 1983, the primary school Islamia.
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Yusuf/Cat Stevens is 70
Back with old friends
In 2003, the first major music festival to be held in Cape town in favour of Nelson Mandela’s Anti-Aids campaign 46664. With Mandela himself, Annie Lennox (Eurythmics), Brian May (Queen) and Yusuf has been playing the guitar again and on the stage to his Muslim last name omitted.
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Yusuf/Cat Stevens is 70
A regular guest at Festivals
In 2006, the first Folk-Pop Album “an Other Cup” for almost 30 years. It contains new Songs and some new recorded Hits from the “old” Cat Stevens-time. The cover version of “Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood” (on German about: “don’t get me wrong”) speaks volumes. The Western world has him so again, and so he travels from Festival to Festival, and numerous concerts.
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Yusuf/Cat Stevens is 70
The circle closes
Six plates, the last coming in 2017 on the market. On “The Laughing Apple” is Yusuf again, Cat Stevens, Cat Stevens is still Yusuf. The critics have taken kindly to him; one writes: “he will come to his old, I guess.” 20. July celebrates the musician his 70. Birthday. Happy birthday, Yusuf/Cat Stevens!
-
Yusuf/Cat Stevens is 70
Morning has broken…
At the beginning of the 1970s Cat Stevens starts a great career as a Humorous Poet. His soft voice and the gentle songs of the late flowers children will be enchanted up in the 1980s. Songs like “Peace Train” fit-for-peace movement, “My Lady D’Arbanville” and “Father And Son” camp-fire classics. Also his songs from the Soundtrack to the cult film “Harold and Maude” are unforgettable.
-
Yusuf/Cat Stevens is 70
A new life
At the end of the 70’s circuit with Cat Stevens and music. He is called now Yusuf Islam and preaching his new Faith. The, not everybody’s understanding. Attention he excited, as he appears to support the Fatwa against Salman Rushdie. So he says in an Interview that if Rushdie showed up with him, he wanted to try”, Ayatollah Khomeini, to call and tell him where the man is”.
-
Yusuf/Cat Stevens is 70
Peace preacher
He denied to assist with this sentence, the Fatwa, but manages to clear up the accusations out of the way. So, he advocates vehemently that Islam is considered a peaceful Religion. He is involved in aid projects in Kosovo or in Iraq, but also in his home town of London. So, he founded, alongside other Muslim schools in London in 1983, the primary school Islamia.
-
Yusuf/Cat Stevens is 70
Back with old friends
In 2003, the first major music festival to be held in Cape town in favour of Nelson Mandela’s Anti-Aids campaign 46664. With Mandela himself, Annie Lennox (Eurythmics), Brian May (Queen) and Yusuf has been playing the guitar again and on the stage to his Muslim last name omitted.
-
Yusuf/Cat Stevens is 70
A regular guest at Festivals
In 2006, the first Folk-Pop Album “an Other Cup” for almost 30 years. It contains new Songs and some new recorded Hits from the “old” Cat Stevens-time. The cover version of “Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood” (on German about: “don’t get me wrong”) speaks volumes. The Western world has him so again, and so he travels from Festival to Festival, and numerous concerts.
-
Yusuf/Cat Stevens is 70
The circle closes
Six plates, the last coming in 2017 on the market. On “The Laughing Apple” is Yusuf again, Cat Stevens, Cat Stevens is still Yusuf. The critics have taken kindly to him; one writes: “he will come to his old, I guess.” 20. July celebrates the musician his 70. Birthday. Happy birthday, Yusuf/Cat Stevens!
Cat Stevens is already a huge pop star, as he threatens to drown 1974 in the Pacific ocean off the coast of Malibu. Praying he saves himself just in the country, converts to the Muslim Faith, throws away his guitar and is now Yusuf Islam.
With 19 already a Star
Before that, Cat Stevens was, above all, an icon of the late Hippies and flower children, a Singer-Songwriter, of summoning the peace of the world, to whose music it is a stick of incense lit, or a Joint. In Songs like “Morning Has Broken”, “Moon Shadow” or “Peace Train” was hugging the whole world, “The First Cut Is The Deepest” was the Soundtrack to heartache attacks, and “Father And Son” is a campfire classic.
As he released in 1967 his first Album was Cat Stevens 19 years old. “Matthew And Son” was directly a Hit Album, full of diverse pop songs with rich, as well as his successor, “the New Masters”. Cat Stevens, the dark-haired son of a Greek Cypriot father and a Swedish mother, the man with the soft voice and the musical diversity that was became an overnight teen Idol.
Idol of the flower children: Cat Stevens 1970
But then fell ill with tuberculosis and went out. In this time he wrote a number of Songs, turned from Pop and Folk. In April 1970, he returned: the point of searching, dreamy and now with zauseligem full beard. And the wave of success started again: Stevens panels published semi-annually, including celebrities such as “Tea For The Tillerman”, “Mona Boe Jakon” and “Teaser And The Firecat”, all in so short intervals that they comply with with the Buy. Until 1978 there were a total of 13 albums. And then the radical cut came to life in Cat Stevens.
“Sin and greed”
After the high spiritual experience in the sea of the Qur’an met him – his brother gave him the book, opened to him a new perspective on life. At the age of 29, he put an abrupt end to his music career: With the “sin and greed” of the music business, he wanted to have nothing more to do. Just as little in common with his earlier Songs, whose texts were not incompatible with his new Faith. The royalties of these Songs he donated to charities. His new life of Yusuf Islam dedicated to his Faith and its Teachings. He married, fathered six children, founded three Muslim schools in London and fought against the bad reputation that Islam is a global Terror.
During the opening of the Arab-Islamic people’s conference, 1993, quoted Yusuf in Khartoum/Sudan from the Koran.
Yusuf Islam was in those years, however, often in the criticism. He was caught in the suspicion to support the murder call against Salman Rushdie, he could also never quite set aside. Israel granted him entry ban issued because he donated to the Palestinian Hamas money.
A full-blooded musician with a firm Faith
His first Album as Yusuf Islam, appeared in 1995. “The Life Of The Last Prophet” is a biography a type of spoken car. There is more music to come from him – but without the guitar, his early favorite instrument: she was a “Western Instrument”. One day, however, he saw the guitar of his son. Since he could not do otherwise and handle.
Slowly but surely, Yusuf was re-emerging from his self-chosen musical oblivion. He joined in 1997 after 17 years in public again, played here and there at charity Festivals, brought out new plates. Also with guitar. In the meantime, he is called simply “Yusuf,” his official artist name is Yusuf/Cat Stevens. The most recent Album released in 2017, bears the title “The Laughing Apple” and reminds both the Cover as the music strongly reminiscent of his famous work “Tea For The Tillerman” in 1970. Here’s a circle actually: Yusuf has made friends with his past as Cat Stevens became friends, and looking back now, with 70 years, happy both in his life.