Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, the popular Pakistani singer who received acclaim in

the West through his work with Eddie Vedder and Peter Gabriel, died

Saturday (Aug. 16) in London. The 49-year-old performer (some sources say he was 48) had already been

admitted to a hospital for medical treatment when he suffered a heart

attack, according to an Associated Press report.

Although he was hugely famous in Pakistan for his Islamic devotional music,

Khan made inroads into the western music community though his contributions

to soundtracks such as Dead Man Walking (with Vedder) and Natural

Born Killers (with Gabriel). More recently the singer had worked with

British trip hoppers Massive Attack and had invited Joan Osborne to study

with him in Pakistan.

The late Jeff Buckley penned the liner notes to a Khan album that will be released on August 26 (Buckley had also interviewed the singer for an article that ran in the January, '96 issue of Interview magazine). The Khan album, a double CD package titled

The Supreme Collection Vol. 1, features traditional devotional music

recorded in 1988 but until now unissued in the United States.

In Sunday's L. A. Times, guitarist/producer Ry Cooder described working with Khan on "The Long Road," one of two Vedder/Khan collaborations for Dead Man Walking. " Man, talk about cut and run," Cooder said. "Here's Eddie Vedder. He's got a song. And here's Nusrat and his guys. So Eddie plays his tune, this little sad song about losing a friend. And Nusrat sits there and goes into a trance, with his finger up his nose, completely tranced out, just waiting.

"Meanwhile, Nusrat's harmonium player (Farrukh Fateh Ali Khan) sits there listening carefully, figuring it out. Suddenly, he decides, 'Oh, yeah, we've got one like that.' So he nudges Nusrat out of his trance and says something like, 'It's this song -- it's No. 10,000.' And they take off, doing it their own way."

Khan was considered a world master of the Sufi devotional music known as

qawwali; in Pakistan, more than 100 of his albums were released. Audiences at venues from Los Angeles' House of Blues to Boston's

Symphony Hall found it unnecessary to speak the Urdu language to be swept

up by the emotional intensity of his music. Backed by a string section,

drummers, harmoniums and a chorus, Khan's hypnotic and droning assembly

would build to a climax in hopes of transporting listeners to the state

Sufis call "ishq," or the harmonic coexistence of earthly passion and

divine love.

Earlier this year, Khan's 1996 Night Song album, recorded with

ambient guitarist Michael Brook for Gabriel's Real World label (Khan recorded a number of albums for the label), received a

Grammy nomination for World Music Album of the Year; his Intoxicated

Spirit was nominated for Best Traditional Folk Album.

Kahn hailed from a family that produced noted qawwali singers for hundreds

of years. The singer absorbed criticism from traditionalists who frowned

upon his work with western artists.

Over the past several years, the obese Kahn suffered numerous medical

problems linked to his weight.