washerman's dog: Begum Akhtar

Showing posts with label Begum Akhtar. Show all posts

Thursday, September 8, 2011

Queen of the Ghazal: Begum Akhtar

To round off this mini-series of women singers who better to take center stage than Akhtari Bai Faizabadi or as she was known by her stage name, Begum Akhtar.

Begum Akhtar was the real thing when it came to thumri, dadra and ghazal. Unlike Lata Mangeshkar and Meena Kumari who sang and acted ‘like’ courtesans (tawaif) in films such as Pakeezah, Begum Akhtar was one of the last links to that north Indian mujra culture that has so captured the imaginations of writers, historians and artists for the past 150 years.

Born in the small mofussil town of Faizabad about 100 kilometers from Lucknow, the great center of late-Mughal north Indian culture and art, Akhtari Bai’s life was not too far off from the conflicted story of Sahibjaan depicted in Pakeezah. The tawaif’s life was lived in a tough triangle of lust, shame and desire (for respectability). Many a man with means, social backing and unrealistic expectations tried their hand at taming the shrew.

In the early 20^th century a young Faizabad lawyer fell in ‘love’ with and married a tawaif but soon tired of her (and one assumes, the social opprobrium). Like a villainous lover in the Bollywood melodrama, he abandoned his wife and two young daughters, including one named Bibbi. Bibbi had an ear for a melody and a relative arranged for her to study with Ustad Abdul Wahid Khan. Under his tutelage Akhtari Bai gained a grounding in thumri, khayal and dadra as well as ghazal. Her sweet voice and good looks were perfectly suited to a film career and though she did act and sing in several films she quickly chose the path of classical music.

At the age of 31 Akhtari Bai, in her own bid for respectability, married a successful Lucknow lawyer who immediately imposed a ban on her singing in public. The girl who had been raised in a mileu of song and dance, who had studied and perfected several styles of semi-classical singing and who neither knew nor wanted any other life, was silenced. Again, one need not think too long before the mind turns to any of a hundred cruel screen husbands from Bombay.

Begum Akhtar’s spirit wilted and she became sick. Physicians at last recommended that her only hope was to return to singing and her husband relented. On the day after she recorded her first ghazals after 4 years of imposed silence, she wept in the studio. In the remaining years of her life she went on to perform regularly on All India Radio, TV and stages all across India. She earned the name Queen of the Ghazal. The great Urdu poet Kaifi Azmi is quoted as saying “The word ghazal has two meanings: Begum Akhtar.”

Tonight’s choice is a collection of 6 ghazals recorded 5 years before her death in 1974. All are fine examples of her command of melody and rhythm, with so many great performances. My own favorite being Ilaahi kaash gham-e-ishq.

Track Listing:

01 Kuchh Duniyan ki Inayaat ne Dil Tod Diya

02 Ab To Yahi Hain

03 Bazm se Unki

04 Ab Chalakte Hue Saaghar

05 Kis Se Poochain

06 Ilahi Kaash Gham-e-Ishq

Listen here.

Wednesday, July 20, 2011

Genius of Delhi: Mirza Asadullah Khan Ghalib

Mirza Ghalib

Let me introduce tonight’s superstar line up.

Mirza Asadullah Khan ‘Ghalib’: South Asia’s greatest Urdu poet, chronicler of Delhi, public intellectual.

Mohammad Rafi: Indian cinema’s prolific golden voiced playback giant. Singer of 26,000 songs over 4 decades.

Begum Akhtar: Doyen of the thumri and ghazal. One of India’s greatest modern vocal artists.

Kaifi Azmi: Urdu poet, writer, actor, leftist intellectual. Father of Shabana Azmi.

Khayyam: Multi-awarded composer of Indian films and music.

1857 Attack on Delhi

The album: The Prose and Poetry of Ghalib, issued on the centenary of the great man’s death. Kaifi Azmi reads exerpts (some hilarious, some horrific, all very humane) from Ghalib’s letters. Rafi and Begum Akhtar sing his poetry set to music for the occasion by Khayyam. Side one is a general introduction to Ghalib’s wit and wisdom. Side two is played out against the tragic and painful destruction of Delhi, the city he so loved, by the English, during the 1857 First War of Independence.

Mirza Asadullah Khan Ghalib (1797-1869) who has been compared with Goethe is one of the most beloved and endearing of Indian poets.

The worldly glories of Ghalib’s ancestors (who proudly traced their descent from the ancient Kings of Iran) had departed long ago. The academic traditions of Avicenna had also vanished in preceding centuries. Therefore, Ghalib turned his pen into his personal heraldic banner. “The broken spears of the ancestors were transferred into a fiery quill.” His pen illumined the wasteland of his life. His courageous spirit led him by still waters and green pastures. This magnificent sweep of his creativeness enriched Urdu literature for all time. Ghalib was endowed with a rare intellect, transcidental vision and an outstanding and ingenious artistry.

Of an astonishingly catholic bent of mind, Ghalib did not differentiate between Hindus, Muslims, Christians and Jews. He never said his prayers, did not fast during the month of Ramzan and continued his love for drinking to the end of his days. He called himself a sinner and had an implicit faith in God, in the Prophet and in the religion of Islam. His appetite for the good things in life was enormous. He hungered after knowledge and also yearned for social position and worldly status. He loved good food, good wine, good music and pretty faces. Whenever he was in possession of some of those things, he fancied himself to be happier than kings.

Ghalib called himself “a rebel, irreverent to the polite rules of ghazal writing.” This non-conformist poet appeared on the literary scene as a novel and unique personality whose fiery assertion of self was tinged with a strange rebellion which expressed itself through scepticism, satire and romantic fancy. This mood made the poet laugh through his tears and gave a new grandeur and meaning to the human condition.

Ghalib’s popularity is due to the fact that apart from other qualities his poetic mood and temper is that of a modern man. This new emotion is also in harmony with the mood and character of a new, emergent India.

Today Ghalib’s poetry has dome to us as an interpreter of the past as well as a pointer to the present. It possesses the pleasing hangover of a bygone era and the exhilarating intoxication of the present times. It conveys to us the agony of the night that has fled and the joyful light of the sun that is newly risen.

Ghalib’s greatness lies in the fact that he not only encompassed the inner turmoil of his age, but also created new urges, inner agitations and demands. Breaking through the bonds of time his poetry reaches out into the past and into the future. (Ali Sardar Jafri, on the liner notes)

Some Ghalib-isms

He gave me heaven and earth, and assumed I'd be satisfied;

Actually I was too embarrassed to argue.

Oh, Lord, it is not the sins I have committed that I regret, but those which I have had no opportunity to commit