Good news for the fans of Ustad Allaudin Khan and Maihar Gharana
Frederic
Good news for those who were wondering what was the music of the first
guru of Ustad Allauddin Khan, Gopal Krishna Bhattacharya (or
Bhattacharjee) alias "Nulo Gopal".
As you certainly know, Allaudin KhanSaab has discovered classical music
thru his teachings, and developed a strong taste for Dhrupad.
Unfortunately, Nulo Gopal died of the plague before he could finish his
training.
We have found the direct heir of this very rare dhrupad style. His name
was (he died last March) Pandit Shivshankar Mukherjee. His grandfather,
Kalidan Mukherjee, was the main student of Gopal Krishna Bhattacharya.
This Pandit Shivshankar Mukherjee was a real gharanedar, his only gurus
were from his family, his grand-father and father.
Senya gharana vocal dhrupad in Bengal used to be one of the strongest
branches in India with Vishnupur and others in the 19th century, until
Rabindranath Tagore decided to strip the poems of the hundreds of
compositions from Tansen, Baiju Bawra, Haridas Swami and the 4 nayaks.
He kept the music, removed the words, put his own poems instead, and
eventually killed the Senia ghana of Bengal... The musicians called to
perform mostly Rabindranathjee poem, slowly forgot about the real poems
- except a few, like Shivshankar family.
Like you, I did'nt know until recently that anybody from that style was
still practicing. Shivshankarjee was a very difficult man to reach and
approach. Living out of Calcutta in a small village and never singing in
the festivals of music. The effort and patience of Francis Tupper has
been rewarding, he has given us a fantastic recording of Shivshankarjee.
Just in time as the singer died six months later.
You can listen to 2mn of his music and buy the cd online for 14 euros
first class post paid at
http://makar-records.com
Warmest regards to all
Frederic
doo...@excite.com
> Senya gharana vocal dhrupad in Bengal used to be one of the strongest
> branches in India with Vishnupur and others in the 19th century, until
> Rabindranath Tagore decided to strip the poems of the hundreds of
> compositions from Tansen, Baiju Bawra, Haridas Swami and the 4 nayaks.
> He kept the music, removed the words, put his own poems instead, and
> eventually killed the Senia ghana of Bengal... The musicians called to
> perform mostly Rabindranathjee poem, slowly forgot about the real poems
> - except a few, like Shivshankar family.
What ignorant drivel. I expected better from Makar. The Dhrupad
tradition was strong only in a few courts. Tagore's music appealed to
the masses. Pre-Rabindric mass Bengali music was bhajan, kirtan,
tappa, thumri etc (latter two mostly in urban areas). Tagore's
ability to combine rich, classically allusive and sruti-madhur or
pleasing to the ear verse coupled with rather watered down music
appealed to the newly literate and intellectually aspiring minds of
the Bengali upper and middle classes and eventually became the core of
the Bengali self-image. Not for nothing was he called the Bard of
Bengal. The Dhrupad texts, at least the way Bengali dhrupadias sung
it was a coarse form as is very clear from the clips you have put out.
It was completely unworthy of competitive success in the face of the
then prevalent and dominant styles of Khayal and Dhrupad. So water
found its level and this type of singing became viewed as rustic and
worth listening to for about the same reasons that one listens to
Ramkumar Chattopadhyay. It has nothing to do with the sleazy
imputations you make about Tagore's modus operandi.
If you want to claim that the stuff you have put out was somehow
killed by Tagore stealing the melodic material, you are deaf and
ignorant of Bengali. If you are not deaf or know Bengali, and you
still hold this opinion, then either your brain or your soul is dead.
So please apologize for talking through the seat of your pants and
destroy your publicity materials. It is ok to have strong opinions
and proclaim them, but it is not OK to be stupid.
And by the way, its called Rabindrasangeet, not "Rabindranathjee
poem."
>
> Like you, I did'nt know until recently that anybody from that style was
> still practicing. Shivshankarjee was a very difficult man to reach and
> approach. Living out of Calcutta in a small village and never singing in
> the festivals of music. The effort and patience of Francis Tupper has
> been rewarding, he has given us a fantastic recording of Shivshankarjee.
> Just in time as the singer died six months later.
And what, if one may ask makes it special other than its
inaccessibility to Frederick and Makar as they dine at the top of
Eiffel Tower? The utterly clueless rhabdolagnaic self-indulgence of
your semi-putrid prose is enough to justify invoking the wrath of that
Indra, Rajan Parrikar, Destroyer of Ehno-pimipic Dasyus.
[I never thought that I would use that horrid term with such sheer
delight, but you have made me realize how truly insightful this
appelation is.]
Thunder O Indra Parrikar, for we offer oblations and burn the fat
waiting for your bolts of lightning to rain down on this hapless Dasyu
who speaks from regions where Raghu goeth not.
r. "the irate Rabindric"
Frederic
doo...@excite.com (doo...@excite.com) wrote:
I know I had to suffer ignominious attack from Tagore's disciples, but,
from the top of the Effeil tower I can see your ignorance too, dear R.,
Tagore did strip 400 years old Dhrupad poems to create the rabindranath
sangeet. If You Think I 'm ignorant let's speak about Sangeet Chandrika
or Sangit Manjari, with more than 2000 drupads and Dhamar, published in
Bengal around 1900, just to see how much the Senya was weak in Bengal at
that time.
Your hatred is oblitering your sight, my friend and if you are not able
to take an historical fact, too bad.
Calm down and Take care of Indra afterburns
Frederic the self-indulgent?
Ashok
>The utterly clueless rhabdolagnaic self-indulgence of
>your semi-putrid prose
>r. "the irate Rabindric"
I liked your outburst. It was well-earned by the origianal poster. But
I didn't get "rhabdolagnaic".
Ashok
doo...@excite.com
> In article <b80f12c9.04042...@posting.google.com>,
> doo...@excite.com (doo...@excite.com) wrote:
>
> I know I had to suffer ignominious attack from Tagore's disciples, but,
> from the top of the Effeil tower I can see your ignorance too, dear R.,
> Tagore did strip 400 years old Dhrupad poems to create the rabindranath
> sangeet. If You Think I 'm ignorant let's speak about Sangeet Chandrika
> or Sangit Manjari, with more than 2000 drupads and Dhamar, published in
> Bengal around 1900, just to see how much the Senya was weak in Bengal at
> that time.
Frederick
Your persistent abuse of terminology undermines your credibility. It
is rabindrasangeet (NOT "rabindranath sangeet"). I have
SangeetachandrikA sitting on my desk (re-published by Rabindrabharati,
which I should note is devoted to propagating the legacy of
Rabindranath ... which sort of knocks your accusations over sideways a
bit I think). What specifically about Sangeetchandrika do you wish to
dicuss? Here is my take on what you are saying. If you read the
Bengali in which Gopeshwar Babu introduces the subject of
SangeetachandrikA, if you look at his objectives as expressed in his
own words, "Asha kori bimala-snighdhojwwala-chandrakiraner nyaya ihate
shongiter shubimol shusheeetal bhAti prokAshito hoibe ..." How many
people in Bengal at that time who were outside the middle classes
(which was very small at that time) could have understood what on
earth he was talking about, let alone read it? Second, notice that
most of the text in SangeetachandrikA is Hindi poems that have been
transliterated into Bengali so that is a clue that it was not mass
music either.
I have read Swami Pragyananda's comments on the musical history of
Bengal and also things like Dilipkumar Mukhopadhyaya's BAngAlIr
rAgshongIt chorchA (1965, Firma KLM Private Limited, Calcutta) and
other accounts of who in Bengali society was listening to what kind of
music. As I understand it, there were several different strands of
music that were prevalent and very much in the air so to speak: the
tappa system, the four-stanza Bengali khayal, the dhrupad style and
also the Vivekanada-inspired, raga-music based Brahma sangeet. Also
there was a sort of semi-permeable social stratification. UcchAngo
shongIt ("higher" music) was, broadly speaking, confined to the landed
aristocracy and the city elites who vied for social respectaibilty.
Then there were the musical forms such of thumri, tappa, dadra, kajri,
chaiti etc. were more popular among urban circles and when rendered by
nubile young courtesans, among the hormonally-imbalanced younger males
of the monied classes (cf. Satyajit Ray's Jalsaghar). Also there was
palligeeti or folk music, baul music as well as forms such as
bhATIyAlI, the boat-men's song. In literature, following Vidasagar
and Bankim, and filtered through the immortal genius of Michael
Madhusudan Dutta, there was a re-emphasis on making Bengali a
powerful, rich, classically allusive and yet flexible language that
could have the power to transmit the Sankritic heritage and yet also
capture the folksiness and the bottom-up view of life that
characterizes the Bengali soul (as my father puts it, the fact that
the bitter flavor is always a part of every proper formal Bengali meal
says something about our character as a people or more appropriately,
"jati").
Rabindranath's family esp. his uncle Jyotirindramohan were deeply
associated with all aspects of the musical revival in Bengal in the
19th century (His family were a bit like the Medicis of Bengal, though
far shorter-lived and on a much smaller scale that the originals).
Consequently, Rabindranath grew up surrounded by all these forms and
trends in the urban environments in which the modern Bengali aesthetic
was being forged. But he also picked up folk forms in his various
travels administering the family estates. His genius was to absorb
all these influences and to transform them into his own new universal
voice.
Which is why the accusatory tone of your comments about the links
between Tagore's music and the Dhrupad/Dhamar style of singing is so
obviously ignorant, partial and worng-headed as to be transparently
ridiculous. Tagore's work and voice was the descendant and thus a
fusion of many different voices, traditions and influences. A far
better way to assess what Tagore did is to say that he absorbed
everything that came his way to create a unique meld of text and music
that penetrated to the core of (or is it more correct to say forged?)
the Bengali heart and mind. My own theory is that because he was so
in tune with so many strands and corss-currents of Bengali culture of
his time that he was able to understand the same thing in three
different ways and thus write in a manner that had something for
everyone. At a time when Bengali culture was in its first flush, this
man of unique artisitic ability and sensitivity stood at the epicenter
of the transformation because of a fortuitious accident of birth. He
created a unique form of poetry and music that was rich, powerful,
majestic and yet limpid and lucid, in sum a beautiful synthesis that
spoke to many people at many levels and played an important role in
gluing together a discernably Bengali soul and sensisbility. Thus is
he truly the Bard of Bengal.
Not that this was without cost. I have heard from my father that he
(Rabindranath, not my father) was also called, with malice utterly
forethought, "bongo-botobrikkho." This translates literally into "the
banyan tree of bengal" with the caustic allusion that just as nothing
grows under the banyan tree, nothing can flourish in the pall that
Tagore cast over the literature and the literary sensibilities of his
time ... a sort of sorry-weepy-romantic-feminine aesthetic, as opposed
the more under-class consciousness of other writers who were not from
similar backgrounds and thus experienced life buttt-naked to the pins
and pricks of everyday exigiencies of Bengali life, rather than
through the protective filter of the velvet cushions of the Tagore
fortune.
>
> Your hatred is oblitering your sight, my friend and if you are not able
> to take an historical fact, too bad.
> Calm down and Take care of Indra afterburns
Nyah, much as I feel Rabithakur was too prolix for his own good and
wrote a lot of second-rate drivel he should have strangled at birth,
it is undeniable he truly bestrode his world (Bengali culture) like a
colossus and we need to recognize him for what he was if we are to
understand our own antecendents. He was, in the arts and artisitic
sensibility of Bengal, what classical sanskrit poets have called a
kalpAntakAlapavana (loosely, epoch-ending-gale) with both good and bad
effects on Bengal, India and the world. I feel that while he must be
judged exactly and not forgiven his transgressions or, more precisely,
while the deleterious impact on Bengali arts and society of how his
work was used by others must also be recognized, it does us no good to
tolerate uninformed opinions such as the one you have put forward.
You abuse your freedom to post when you ignore your responsibility to
be responsible in the comments you make in your liner notes or in your
advertising material. If you were doing this for love, i.e., not for
money, I would still criticize you but I would not accuse you of
ethno-pimping. You would just be yet another person who, in the
immortal phrase attributed to Enrico Fermi, "is not even wrong." But
since you are out to make a buck and there is a grave danger that you
will impress young unformed minds with this sort of Orientalist
garbage [by which I mean an unreasoning insistence on formatting
another person's reality into your own paradigm either because you
cannot be bothered to learn that paradigm, or do not even have a
concept that there can be other paradigms, or consciously choose to do
the reformatting].
cheers,
r.
Sambit Basu
> Tagore's music appealed to
> the masses.
Rabindrsangeet for masses!? It will be interesting to know
your definition of masses. RS initially appelaed to the
elites of the elites only - urban, educated, rich people -
a lot of them were Brahmos, concentrated mostly in Kolkata
and later in Shantiniketan.
Even today, RS is yet to appeal the masses.
> Pre-Rabindric mass Bengali music was bhajan, kirtan,
> tappa, thumri etc (latter two mostly in urban areas).
Out of these only Kirtan was somewhat popular to the
masses. They were more interested in Kabigaan, Tarjaa,
Aakhrai, half-aakhrai, Kheur etc. After Nidhu's time,
only the urban folks got interested in tappa as you
have pointed out.
- Sambit
Sambit Basu
> Senya gharana vocal dhrupad in Bengal used to be one of the strongest
> branches in India with Vishnupur and others in the 19th century, until
> Rabindranath Tagore decided to strip the poems of the hundreds of
> compositions from Tansen, Baiju Bawra, Haridas Swami and the 4 nayaks.
> He kept the music, removed the words, put his own poems instead, and
> eventually killed the Senia ghana of Bengal... The musicians called to
> perform mostly Rabindranathjee poem, slowly forgot about the real poems
> - except a few, like Shivshankar family.
So, Tagore single-handedly killed Senia gharana!!! Is it
something you came up with or got it from Shivshankar
family. Whoever it is, this ludicrous claim is not even
worth a serious debate.
Just curious, exactly how many compositions for each of the
named stalwart did "Rabindrnathjee" strip poems of? A
representative list would be helpful instead of just
hand-waving.
- Sambit
doo...@excite.com
> I liked your outburst. It was well-earned by the origianal
:) :)
> poster. But I didn't get "rhabdolagnaic".
From rhabdo (pertaining to the digestive tract) + lagnaiappe
(gratuity).
I was introduced to the orotund splendour of this magnificient word by
my first real English teacher, Sriman Biplab Dasgupta [better known to
the public at large as a face of Calcutta Doordarshan and an actor and
director of no small talent]. It remains fundamental.
r.
doo...@excite.com
> doo...@excite.com (doo...@excite.com) wrote:
>
> > Tagore's music appealed to
> > the masses.
>
> Rabindrsangeet for masses!? It will be interesting to know
> your definition of masses. RS initially appelaed to the
> elites of the elites only - urban, educated, rich people -
> a lot of them were Brahmos, concentrated mostly in Kolkata
> and later in Shantiniketan.
>
> Even today, RS is yet to appeal the masses.
>
I am not sure how or whether to argue this point. Perhaps I over-reached.
Initially RabibAni (to coin a term), did appeal to the upper classes the
most, because of the highly sophisticated "voice" and its undeniably
classical roots. But don't you think that by 1920s and 1930s, this bAni had
indeed become pervasive in written and spoken Bengali? Which led to fierce
fights between the detractors of Rabindranath and Rabindranath's followers.
These fights became so fierce and personal that they were responsible for
bitter animosities that led to the bongo-bottobrikkho type comments.
Sukanto on through to Buddhadev (i.e., "khudharto manusher kacche purnimar
chand jyano kholshano ruti" to "tumi aar ami dujone bonchito etc." ... aar
bola gyalo na, ei public forum-e) represents a reaction to the pervasiveness
of Rabindra-bani in the general Bengali intellectual climate (and an
entirely welcome development too, IMO). So if all you and I are arguing
about whether RS was truly ever the voice of the people, I will freely grant
you that it was not. But it did permeate the Bengali intellectual
consciousness which was then transmitted to the masses through the education
system and the wider media. It also opened the door for the successors to
RS in the usual way of discourse (thesis, antithesis etc..)
> > Pre-Rabindric mass Bengali music was bhajan, kirtan,
> > tappa, thumri etc (latter two mostly in urban areas).
>
> Out of these only Kirtan was somewhat popular to the
> masses. They were more interested in Kabigaan, Tarjaa,
> Aakhrai, half-aakhrai, Kheur etc. After Nidhu's time,
> only the urban folks got interested in tappa as you
> have pointed out.
>
Point well taken. I apologize, my original statement was not precise.
IIRC, in that paragraph I was talking about forms of rag-bhittik shongit.
Then in a later para I pointed to the large body of folk music from which I
understand Rabithakur drew inspiration, but I am not very well informed
about palli-geeti and the forms you have talked about. I would like to know
more. Any suggestions or insights?
r.
shri kanekal
>
>
> Which is why the accusatory tone of your comments about the links
> between Tagore's music and the Dhrupad/Dhamar style of singing is so
> obviously ignorant, partial and worng-headed as to be transparently
> ridiculous. Tagore's work and voice was the descendant and thus a
Right on doogie-doo. Frogs are best left to croak along
> [...]
> immortal phrase attributed to Enrico Fermi, "is not even wrong." But
> [...]
> r.
that would be Pauli old chap.
Der alte Wolfgang sagt -" Das ist nich recht. Das ist nich einmal falsch"
Auf Englisch that would be -
That is not correct. It isnt even wrong
Garlic-breathing frogs old boy ... best left to themselves
cheers then eh ?
Shri
doo...@excite.com
> > [...]
> > immortal phrase attributed to Enrico Fermi, "is not even wrong." But
> > [...]
> > r.
>
> that would be Pauli old chap.
>
> Der alte Wolfgang sagt -" Das ist nich recht. Das ist nich einmal falsch"
>
> Auf Englisch that would be -
> That is not correct. It isnt even wrong
Ach so! Danke sehr, Herr Kanekal.
> cheers then eh ?
Right! Pip pip, tallyho and all that too!!
r.
doo...@excite.com
> Der alte Wolfgang sagt -" Das ist nich recht. Das ist nich einmal falsch"
Herr Kanekal
Für mein website möchte gern ich ein URL für das Zitat [auf Deutsch].
Danke sehr!
r.
Sambit Basu
> Sukanto on through to Buddhadev (i.e., "khudharto manusher kacche purnimar
> chand jyano kholshano ruti" to "tumi aar ami dujone bonchito etc." ... aar
> bola gyalo na, ei public forum-e) represents a reaction to the pervasiveness
> of Rabindra-bani in the general Bengali intellectual climate (and an
> entirely welcome development too, IMO).
No contest here.
So if all you and I are arguing
> about whether RS was truly ever the voice of the people, I will freely grant
> you that it was not. But it did permeate the Bengali intellectual
> consciousness which was then transmitted to the masses through the education
> system and the wider media. It also opened the door for the successors to
> RS in the usual way of discourse (thesis, antithesis etc..)
You are right, I was contesting more "about whether RS was
truly ever the voice of the people". But if you are talking
about RS's influence on a section of intellectuals, I'll
admit it had a tremendous impact.
However, one of my (and, of course, of lot of other people's)
regret is no grassroot movement took advantage of Rabindranath's
view on socio-economic reforms that he instituted in his
Zamindari in Patisar, Silaidaha and later in Sriniketan etc.
It had more potential to have effect in a positive way on
the masses.
[Since the thread is potentially going off-topic, I have taken
the liberty to cross-post it to soc.culture.bengali]
> Then in a later para I pointed to the large body of folk music from which I
> understand Rabithakur drew inspiration, but I am not very well informed
> about palli-geeti and the forms you have talked about. I would like to know
> more. Any suggestions or insights?
I cannot point you to one source, since most of information
are gathered over time from different sources. However,
here are a few sources that I found interesting:
1. Bangla Kabyosangeet o Rabindrasangeet: Arun K Basu (Dey's)
As far as I know, it was based on the first PhD thesis on
bangla music. Quite informative.
2. Writings on music by Sudhir Chakrabarty
3. I think there are some information in Binoy Ghosh's work
too. (Suman Chattopadhyay, now Kabir Suman, and Binoy Ghosh
undertook a project of writing the sociological history
of Bangla music in late seventies. The project did not
materialize due to Binoy Ghosh's death in 1980. It would
have been a worthwhile work.)
- Sambit
Abhik Majumdar
>chand jyano kholshano ruti" to "tumi aar ami dujone bonchito etc."
Corect me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the second one by Shakti
Chattopadhyaya?
Abhik
abhik.majumdar at b i g f o o t dot c o m (remove extra spaces)
doo...@excite.com
> >Sukanto on through to Buddhadev (i.e., "khudharto manusher kacche purnimar
> >chand jyano kholshano ruti" to "tumi aar ami dujone bonchito etc."
>
> Corect me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the second one by Shakti
> Chattopadhyaya?
I cannot since you are right and I was wrong. Slap slap!!
r.
Abhik Majumdar
Certainly not. What he apparently killed off was the Senia ghana (sic)
of Bengal, whatever that might be.Leastaways, that's what the mail
says.
I wonder if poor Gurdev even knew that a Senia ghana (of all ghanas)
existed in his homeland.
A question: Was he responsible for killing off the Senia Bengal of
Ghana?
Abhik Majumdar
>I wonder if poor Gurdev
Sorry, that should read 'Gurudev'. Regrettable typo.