Since then he has had nearly 25,000 records to his credit and has rendered nearly all forms of vocalism including classical, thumri, film music and of course the ghazal that he is most widely reputed for. Mehdi Hassan produced his first public performance at the age of eight at the behest of the Maharaja of Baroda. He hails from family that produce fifteen generations of musicians making him the "solva pusht" (sixteenth generation) of artists, with an ancestry that boasts of "Darbari Ustads" who were seasoned performers in the courts of several Maharajahs of Indore, Patna, Chhatarpur and Mysore. Born ( 1927 ) in a village called "Luna" in Rajasthan (India), Mehdi Hassan trained under his father Ustad Azeem Khan and uncle Ustad Ismail Khan. His education was solely in the field of classical music that he had been studying since the age of eight. Mehdi Hassan never had a formal education. An artiste, who has set such towering standards in the light classical music, his career is used as a benchmark along which many young artistes model their own. Mehdi Hassan is undoubtedly one of the most renowned ghazal singers in the world today. Mehdi Hassan or ( Hasan ) as an artiste has earned the kind of acclaim that few in light classical world have witnessed, but his attributes most of this to an unflinching faith in God and of course a deep respect for his art that has got him the fame and adulation. The Sultan or Shahensha Of Ghazal and The Spirit of Sacred Music