JOIN USA doyen of music
Some works create history, attain monumental status and carry forward the traditions by adding vigour and clarity. One such work was Hindustani Sangeet Paddathi – Kramik Pustaka Malika, published in six volumes during 1920s and 1930s by Pandit Vishnu Narayan Bhatkhande, one of the greatest musicologists of 20th Century India. His three-year research took him to the doorsteps of all the practising Hindustani classical music greats of his time.
His written compilation of all the traditional compositions is considered to be ‘a
dictionary of Hindustani classical music’ and till date, has remained the single-most referred and revered book by Hindustani classical music practitioners and connoisseurs. Now, the same has been put into audio format by Pandit Indudhara Nirody, one of the leading Hindustani classical music performers from Karnataka, which is yet another significant contribution to the world of music.
Pandit Bhatkhande (1860-1936), a lawyer by profession, was a vocalist and a Sitar performer from Maharashtra. During early 1900, he developed keen interest in Hindustani classical music and started his research by touring the entire country to meet established practitioners of different gharanas – Gwalior gharana, Agra gharana, Kirana gharana, Jaipur gharana to name a few(a system of social organisation linking musicians to certain styles by lineage or by guru shishya parampara). Apart from interacting with many popular ustads and pandits, he also studied various ancient texts on music.
An extensive compilationBased on these studies and interactions, he published Mallakshaya Sangeetam, a treatise on Hindustani classical music in Sankrit under the pseudonym ‘Chaturpandit’, in 1909. In order to facilitate better understanding of this book, he wrote a critique of the same, a multi-volume piece in simple Marathi called Hindustani Sangeet Paddathi – Kramik Pustaka Malika. This compendium has 1896 compositions in total with clearly indicated notations in tow.
With the publication of this volume, Hindustani classical music entered the realm of text form and this particular publication remained the standard text to begin with for every student of Hindustani classical music.
Pandit Bhatkande was also the first one to start the trend of music schools in India. He established Baroda State Music School in 1916 and later with the help of the
Maharaja of Gwalior, he established Madhav Music College in Gwalior. In 1926, he established Marris College of Music in Lucknow, which is now called as Bhatkhande Institute of Music. Probably, Rabindranath Tagore summarised the efforts of Pandit Bhatkhande in the best way, “What he did in his lifetime would have taken more than three centuries for others.”
Though the musical text has easy to follow notations and explanations about numerous subtle intricacies of music, the practitioners always found the written format little difficult to follow as they are trained by the ear. It was the great musician Acharya K G Ginde, who first thought of recording all the compositions in an audio format. He started the tedious process at Sangeet Research Academy of Kolkata, but passed away before its
completion. Later, Pandit Acharya S C R Bhat decided to carry forward the unfinished task but couldn’t complete it either. Finally, Pandit Indudhar Nirody, disciple of Acharya S C R Bhat and Acharya K G Ginde, with the support of Swarankula Sangeeta Sabha of Mysuru, put all the 1896 compositions into audio clips and called it Samarpan.
Exploring ragas
The audio is recorded on a compact disc and has a printed book containing the list and lyrics of the compositions. Pandit Indudhar, who received the Karnataka Government’s Sangeeth Vidwan Puraskaar award in 2014, says, “The rasikas of music will have an opportunity to listen to some of the rarely heard ragas and compositions as well in this audio format.”
The audio clips have beautiful harmonium and tabla accompaniments by Pandit Veerabhadraiah Hiremath and Pandit Ramesh Dhannur and Pandit Bheemashankar Bidnoor, respectively. “Music like painting, is an art of immediacy. Pandit Bhatkhande’s monumental work was waiting for this transformative touch of immediacy. With Pandit Indudhar’s voice to the compositions, the songs have got a soulful touch,” says Pandit Rajeev Taranath, Sarod maestro from Maihar gharana on Samarpan.
For more details, visit the Swarasankula Sangeeta Sabha website at www.swarasankula.com/media/bhatkande-project/.