[Reader-list] Fifth posting

[Naresh Kumar]

Hi everybody,
When I began working on Harballabh, it was something like a joke for
many of my friends that a festival of a national character that
concentrates on Hindustani classical music only and doesn't allow any
other music to be performed on its stage has been happening for more
than a century in a city like Jalandhar. My surprise crossed all the
limits when Mrs. P.U. Sarkheil, a promising star of Hindustani music
who came to perform in the Spring festival of Harballabh from Rajkot,
told me in her interview [March16th, 2006] that she was unaware of
Harballabh. She got to know about it very recently when some music
practitioners and aficionados from Jalandhar met her in Sangeetalok
Utsava in Ambala where she performed in November-2005 itself.
It is a big astonishment not just for a common person but even an
average listener or learner of Indian classical music that Punjab
possesses a great tradition of classical music since antiquities. For
most of the people it is very difficult to digest the fact that there
can be any classical music when we move from Delhi towards Northwest.
To most of the people Punjabi music means either Bhangrha on the beats
of dhol or the songs set to music in western pop-style. This
Punjabi-pop has acquired so much popularity among young generation
that one can see people twisting their waists on these songs at any
occasion in any part of the country. Actually very few people know
that the sacred Guru Granth Sahib gives strict directions about every
verse being sung in a particular raga. Many ragas like Malkauns,
Sohni, Kafi, Pahadi, Sindh Bhairavi etc have their origin in   folk or
tribal music of Punjab. Even in present time Patiyala gharana, Sham
Chaurasi gharana and above all, Punjab gharana of Tabla with Allarakha
and Zaqir Hussein as its exponents have earned international
recognition.
The reasons behind this stereotypical image of Punjab as the land of
foot-tapping, noisy, nonclassical and unsophisticated music can be
traced to the developments in the 20th century which have affected the
musical as well as socio-economic scenario of not only Punjab but of
the whole country also.
First, the music that used to be a hereditary profession largely for
Muslims now came in the hands of Bengali and Maharashtrian upper caste
people. The nationalization and Hinduization of Indian classical
music, which began in the earlier decades of the 20th century, reached
its zenith when the country achieved independence along with
partition. With the partition, many of the Punjabi singers who were
Muslims migrated to Pakistan. Along with that went the cities like
Lahore, which were the centers of culture in north India.
Secondly, the image of a community, which highlights certain aspects
of its culture and ignores others, owes its origins to the colonial
experience. The Sikhs were the martial race for the British and so,
the music of these people was also supposed to be heavy. Therefore,
only the loud voices and heavy beats of Dhol [drum] were thought to be
the music of Punjab, which suited to their imagery. This image of
Punjabis got more strength in postcolonial Hindi cinema. To glorify
the impacts of Green Revolution, the common Punjabi peasant was
picturized dancing and singing at the time of the harvest in many of
the popular films of 1960s and 70s.
 The major upsurge in Punjabi pop industry has come with the boom in
the cassette and music video industry. In recent years when
cassettes/CDs and recording have become quite cheep and affordable the
music too has become a consumable and disposable commodity rather than
something worth preserving. Obviously, on one hand it has brought
foreword many less-trained upcoming singers and on the other hand this
has affected the content of the lyrics and quality of music also
because simple tunes set to rhythm can be sung without serious efforts
and for a low-cost album it is not necessary to pick up high quality
lyrics.
More than anything else, the taste of the listeners has undergone a
drastic change. Now for a common youth music doesn't mean something
emotional or tranquilizing. It should be exciting and making the body
move. Nobody wants to sit only for listening and enjoying music.
People listen to it while driving. In the present time the words has
hardly any importance and today, the music only means the heavy beats
of metal and drums coming from sophisticated speakers with high
wattage, which can break the glasses of the windows of the rooms.
The reason behind this blending of Punjabi and western music seems to
be somewhat musical also. Simply because, normally Punjabi tunes are
set to four or eight beat rhythmic cycle that corresponds to the
common western one which is used for most of the pop and rock
melodies. So fusing the two hardly causes any inconvenience for
composers. That's why great exponent of Sufi Qawwalis, Us. Nusrat
Fateh Ali Khan started singing on western rhythms and orchestra for
popularizing it in the listeners living beyond the Asian boundaries.
Now a days, this experiment has been picked up by every
singer/composer because it is liked very much by the consumers of
these albums and has become the most-played music on most of the F.M.
radio stations. Rest of the excitement, which cannot come from music,
is created through choreography. Scantly dressed girls dancing on
these songs make them more watchable and sellable.
Obviously, when one Punjabi-pop album gives huge profits and fame in
comparison to that having serious classical songs, why would a
musician opt for a losing game? This financial and popularity affair
compels even the talented singers like Hans Raj 'Hans' to sing more
songs like 'dil chori sada ho gaya' than Sufi and other melodious
things for which he has really got a mastery. Because the price of a
pop album by him is Rs.60 or 75 whereas the cassette containing Sufi
and other good songs costs Rs.30 only in the market.
One of the independent fellows, Siddhartha is planning to work on Hir,
a very famous love-epic of Punjab but very few actually know that more
than poetry, Hir is a musical specialty which has been used by a
number of music-composers in Hindi cinema. One example that strikes
the mind is from the film 'mera nam joker'. Almost every performance
by Ghulam Ali in north India remains incomplete without Hir. Nobody
has the idea who gave this tune. Perhaps it may be Varas Shah, the
author himself but the touching melody of Hir which is in raga
Bhairavi really takes one away from this world of the noises.