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(From Jasim Uddin, Folk Songs of E. Bengal, USIS (1959), Palash Publication, Essays of Jasim Uddin II, 2001)

Folk-song is the collective creation of a whole people

In the old days the life of our country had been one integrated whole. There was no clear-cut line between the outlook and enjoyments of the rich and the poor, and there was give-and-take between the songs and stories of the scholars and those of literate villagers. The song of the poorest peasant, playing his one-stringed instrument in a remote corner of the village .might echo through the seven stories of a great man's house and bring delight there. A prince or a landlord would not hesitate to join the small knot of people who collected in the market-place to listen to .a ragged, wandering teller of tales. Before passing on he might even pay tribute to the artist's skill by hanging some rich gem round his neck.

But now the culture of the modern educated classes was quite cut off from the traditional, unwritten literature of the illiterate. They despised the tradition because it was mixed up with ignorant superstitions, false religious beliefs and outworn ways of thought which would not stand the cold light of logic. In getting rid of it they hardly cared for the beauty and ancient knowledge which they were throwing away along with it; as if a man were to fling away a priceless ornament because of the rust which had accumulated on its surface. To same extent it was destroyed by the Wahhabite Movement (The Muslim World witnessed the appearance of several intellectual and religious movements which emanated from different Islamic territories in the 18th and 19th centuries. A number of social, political and religious causes provided motivation for these multi-faced movements) which I have mentioned. It was a kind of Islamic Puritanism which tried to weed out from the people's enjoyments everything that was corrupt, superstitious and earthbound. What was left was destroyed by the influence of British civilisation. Where that had come, the ways of thought' and life of the upper classes became altogether remote from those of the poor, and the old unity was gone for ever.

The West has given us, much its science, its hygiene, its worldwide outlook and its sense of the value of time. The new Pakistan will accept all this and weave it into its .own pattern of life. All the same, the gift brought with it a loss. The old songs and ballads were too long-drawn-out for the new time conscious man to spend hours listening to them. They repeated themselves interminably and were full of ideas and incidents unpleasing to the modern mind. Yet there was so much in them that might have been preserved. Had there been any great mind with a touch of poetry, some one who loved the new learning and also loved his country's past, it might have been possible to save both. The old songs and tunes, still alive among the people, could have been collected and revised, purged of their corrupt and outworn elements and recreated. They might have become a' link, making the people's mind intelligible to the educated man and bringing the new outlook down to the consciousness of the illiterate. Unfortunately no such leader came.

In the dazzling light of the Western sun the little earthen lamps with which people used to see into the corner of their own room had lost their power of illumination. They could look out at the whole world, but the beautiful things which lay at hand were hidden from sight.

Rabinranath Tagore wrote for the middle class - nothing to the farmers whose genius first given them life

In the last generation the great Rabindranath Tagore, with his depth and universality of outlook, understood al appreciated the folksongs. Especially at the time when he writing Gitanjali, his love of them is apparent in the form and spirit of his poetry and in the echoes of his tunes. But Rabindranath was occupied with too many things to devote himself to the rediscovery of the village traditions. And after all he was writing for middle-class readers, he hesitated present the old tunes in their original form to people would have despised them. What he did was to create a kind of sophisticated version of them. In the minds of the educated classes it did much to awaken a sense of their beauty, but meant little or nothing to the cultivators whose genius first given them life.

The songs were the expression of the spirit to fight for freedom

chttaranjan das Another man who loved and understood them was Chittaranjan Das of Bengal the leader most beloved Bengal who was himself the very incarnation of Bengal. To him the songs were the expression of the spirit of the national in a sense they were the justification of the fight for freedom. He paid glowing tributes to their greatness in many of his addresses to the people. "How can a nation which sings like that remain subject to foreign-overlords?", he would exclaim.

A tradition which ridicules the clash of civilisations

Civilisations are built on the exchange and encounter of different cultural traditions

Jasim Uddin narrates that he has collected more than 10, 000 songs from different villages Of Bengal but the Gazir Song from Sibrampur, Faridpur was one of his best collection (please listen Amarkantho II). Jasim Uddin is very proud of the poor farmers of Bangladesh - traditionally people of Bangladesh have deep love for the all people of the world - liberty, universal brotherhood, freedom and peace for all people of the world irrespect of race, religion and colour.

Gazir Gan songs to a legendary saint popularly known as Gazi Pir. Gazi songs were particularly popular in the districts of faridpur, noakhali, chittagong and sylhet. They were performed for boons received or wished for, such as for a child, after a cure, for the fertility of the soil, for the well-being of cattle, for success in business, etc. Gazi songs would be presented while unfurling a scroll depicting different events in the life of Gazi Pir. On the scroll would also be depicted the field of Karbala, the Ka'aba, Hindu temples, etc. Sometimes these paintings were also done on earthenware pots. Gazir Gan songs to a legendary saint popularly known as Gazi Pir. Gazi songs were particularly popular in the districts of faridpur, noakhali, chittagong and sylhet. They were performed for boons received or wished for, such as for a child, after a cure, for the fertility of the soil, for the well-being of cattle, for success in business, etc.

Gazi songs would be presented while unfurling a scroll depicting different events in the life of Gazi Pir. On the scroll would also be depicted the field of Karbala, the Ka'aba, Hindu temples, etc. Sometimes these paintings were also done on earthenware pots. Gazi songs were preceded by a bandana or hymn, sung by the main singer. He would sing: 'I turn to the east in reverence to Bhanushvar (sun) whose rise brightens the world. Then I adore Gazi, the kind-hearted, who is saluted by Hindus and Mussalmans'. Then he would narrate the story of Gazi's birth, his wars with the demons and the evil spirits, as well as his rescue of a merchant at sea.

Although Gazi Pir was a Muslim, his followers included people from other religious communities as well. Many Gazi songs point out how people who did not respect him were punished. At least one song narrates how Gazi Pir saved the peasantry from the oppression of a zamindar. Another song describes how a devotee won a court case. In Gazi songs spiritual and material interests are often intertwined. The audience give money in charity in the name of Gazi Pir. This genre of songs is almost extinct in Bangladesh today (Prof. Asraf Siddiquie).
The fishes find the deep sea,
The birds the branches of the tree.
The Mother knows her love for her son
By the sharp pain in her heart alone
Many and diverse the colour of the cows,
But white the colour that all milk shows.
Through all the world, a Mother's name-
A Mother's song is found the same.

Black is the pupil of my eye,
Black ink with which I write
Black is Birth and death is black
Black is the universal Night.
(Jasim Uddin)

Amar Kantho I - Voice and Songs of Jasim Uddin

Amar Kantho II- Voice and Songs of Jasim Uddin On Gazir Gan - Part II

In 1922, Dr. Dinesh Chandra Sen of Dacca collected a small group of collaborators, and began gathering the ballads and folklore of East bengal. I was one of those who worked with him, helping to collect several volumes. Some of them were published with the english translations by the University of Calcutta; one volume was translated into French.

Dr. Sen was a true scholar with a genuine love for folk tradition, and he did more than any man before him to awaken in the educated public a sense of its beauty and value.....

I had been born and brought up in a village and brought up entirely by cultivators, and the folk-songs were in my very blood. To me, unlike Dr. Sen, the tunes meant even more than the words : they embodied the meaning of the traditional life I loved.

They enchanted me with their beauty and power, and I was set on making the reading public understand what was in them.

It was not only for the sake of the reading public, it was a question of preserving the life of the tradition itself; because the country people were visibly beginning to imitate the townsfolk, and liked what they liked. If the towns set the example of admiring the songs, the villagers would follow suit and take a pride in them; if the towns despised and neglected them the songs themselves would gradually die out of memory.

So far, however,scholar had worked on our folk-songs in a scientific spirit. About this time Dr. Backey came from the University of Oxford to research on them as a trained scholar. He got the tunes exactly recorded, and studied them in the light of his wider investigations.

But the awakening of interest was not an easy matter, and our first efforts were disheartening. I remember how I came to the town with my beautiful songs, and with the little money. I had I bought ten seers of the best sweets and approached the best singer. He ate my sweets, but he did not sing my songs. I met Mr. Gurusadoy Datta of East Bengal of the Indian Civil Service, who genuinely loved the folk tradition and put his money and enthusiasm into the work. Together we started the Rural Heritage Revival Society, of which he was President " and I was Secretary. We advertised in the papers offering scholarships from a fund supplied by him to students who would study folk-music under our guidance

By about 1930 folk-songs had gained their public in the towns, and the radio began to take them up

... Sometimes I would collect a group of songs and, knowing the taste of the towns, would select from them only those which were likely to be acceptable. I would expurgate the village versions, cutting out the lines which were too vulgar or too frankly erotie to pass in polite society. Sometimes I would learn a song in some cultivator's cottage, of which the melody impressed me but the words were clumsy and crude. So I myself would set new words to it better suited to educated taste. It might be that the villager who gave me the song knew only the tune and three or four lines of the words, and I would make up the rest in the same spirit. These half-original songs were often really valuable because the educated public liked them, and at the same time they suited the village singers and became popular.

The taste was coming to life, and after a while we were joined by some famous singers of our time, whose singing made the folk-songs known much more widely. Many of the songs I taught them were recorded and some of them have become so popular that they are still to be heard in every village of East Bengal. Different gramophone companies began to take up the recording of folk-songs as a commercial proposition. By about 1930 folk-songs had gained their public in the towns, and the radio began to take them up. Sometimes I was able to bring a party of singers to the town from a remote village and give the audience a taste of the authentic, original things.

Bratachari movement

gurusaday In the meantime, Mr. G. S. Datta, of whom I have already spoken, was hard at work in other directions. He toured Bengal to discover and preserve the traditional dances still practiced in remote places, and collect specimens of village art. He founded the Bratachari movement, which I can best describe as a kind of eurhythmical counterpart of the Boy Scouts, and bega11 to te ach the dances in schools and colleges, without any modification of their original forms. He has brought together the materials for a museum of folk art from boTheast and West Bengal

In 1932, he started the Bratachari movement. In his words in The Bratachari Synthesis, first published in 1937,

“ the Movement is to bring back to humanity, in all countries, the ideal and practice of the wholeness of life which, alike in the individual, the national and the international sphere has been so grievously shattered in the modern world in every country by the fragmentary outlook on, and treatment of, life in education, science, work, play and social functioning. ”

In its aim to re-establish life on its fundamental unity, while preserving the inherent values of the individual and regional diversities, the Bratachari movement relies on a system of simultaneous physical, moral and spiritual culture with the three-fold objectives of

i) shaping of life in accordance with a fully balanced ideal comprising the five Bratas or ultimate ideals which are of universal application, and adopting a course for their pursuit for the integration of the culture of the body and the soul, and of the thought, speech, and behaviour;
ii) the pursuit of rhythmic discipline for bringing about unification, harmony and joy as well as inner transformation; and
iii) bringing men and women of every country in touch with the regional culture of their own soil and with the arts and crafts, dances and songs, and customs and manners of their own region, thus providing a natural cultural medium for their healthy all-round growth. By this three-fold sadhana (devotion), the Bratachari system seeks to enable men and women in each land to become, simultaneously, truly national and truly international.

In 1934, the Bangiya Palli Sampad Raksha Samiti was renamed as The Bengal Bratachari Society. In 1936, he started a magazine Banglar Shakti for The Bengal Bratachari Society. Gurusaday Dutt did extensive research in the field of Folk art, crafts and folk dances of Bengal. He collected objects of folk art and crafts from the countryside. He had great compassion for the artists and craftsmen who created unique art objects without any training or technical knowledge. Folk art was neglected and not appreciated in those days. He wrote in different journals about the wealth and beauty of folk art and left his collection on his death to The Bengal Bratachari Society.

I myself have collected about thousands of songs, and have tried to teach the tunes to my students. It is difficult, because no system of musical notation will transcribe them perfectly...

zainul abedin

Boat races have been and still define an important element of folk culture. For centuries Nouka Baich, or boat races have been taking place in the subcontinent.

Haio joan haio
Jore maro haio
Ara jore haio
Delhi chalo hai
Delhi jaite haio
Samuddur haio
Samuddure haio
Hatoo pani haio.

Bengali Folksongs sung by Poet Jasim Uddin , July 24, 1958, Interview Henry Cowell. Courtesy Libary of Congress, Washington, D. C. USA
O majhire, jhor tufaney Music and Lyrics by Jasim Uddin, Singer: Abbasuddin

O Majhi Re by Jasim Uddin from Ganger Par

For several years, the enchanting beauty of the Rupsha River has attracted many writers and poets, including the famous modernist poet of Bangla literature, Jibananada Das. This river has been the source of a livelihood for the many villages that line up by the riverside. Every year, the annual Nouka Baich brings these villages together to test their strength against each other with boat races. Over the years, the baich has become something more than just a boat race. It is today a platform for the villagers to interact, local trades-people to participate in a fair and also a chance to open up to the outside world through the media, flaunting their age-old traditions and cultures

A man with a dhol to keep the rhythm flowing amongst the rowers during the race, two men acting as navigators and one man sitting in the bow, dancing and flaunting his long messy hair, mostly for the sake of the audience. The Nouka Baich, which was to begin, soon promised a colourful performance, which would be witnessed by hundreds of villagers living near and far.

Rowing at full speed with all their strengths, a combination of the rhythmic splashing of water with the singing and dancing on the boats filled the air, not to mention the loud cheers that followed from the audience. Most of the singing on the boats seemed to be a call to God to help them reach their destination as fast and as smoothly as possible.
Since rivers form an integral part of Bangladesh's history, tradition, literature, culture and sports, boat races have been and still define an important element of folk culture. For centuries Nouka Baich, or boat races have been taking place in the subcontinent

Nobody has worked out the history of Bengali folk-songs scientifically, but it is not difficult to tread the main lines of it by commonsense. The earliest kind of songs originates in the cries of men at work on a common task-pulling about ashore, or rolling legs, or doing something else that needs concerted rhythmical effort. Such songs, if they can be called songs, are essentially nothing but a single rhythmical line. The words may change, but the line is repeated with its stresses unaltered; there is nothing that can be called a melody. To wit :

Haio joan haio
Jore maro haio
Ara jore haio
Delhi chalo haio
Delhi jaite haio
Samuddur haio
Samuddure haio
Hatoo pani haio.

It spurs :

Exert yourselves, sturdy fellows
Put in force, fellows
Harder still, fellows
Make for Delhi fellows
To Delhi, fellows
To the ocean, fellows
To the ocean, fellows
Knee-deep water, fellows.

There is a further development when words and rhythm are repeated with slight variations, so that two lines balance each other in a kind of rudimentary tune. Such is this cry of a leader kindling the spirit of his men by threatening the enemy:

Allah dhal Rasultalawar
Ali Julfiqur
Ajker raneami bhangbo sabar ghar re.

It swears: God my shield, Prophet my sabre
Ali (Caliph) my valor,
Hey ,in today's fight I shall break
enemies' necks.

zainul abedin It is a further step towards the growth of a tune when two lines are rhymed together. The next song is merely a recitation, but the tune is more pronounced that in those so far as I have given. The king's daughter is dressing herself

Sonar barani kanya saje nana range,
Kalo megh jano sajilo re
Prathame parila sari name gangajal
Hater upar thuile sari kare talamal
Jalete thuile sari jalete mishai
Mrittikai thuile sari piprai laiya jai
Sei sari pariya kanya sarir pane chai
Monomata na haile dasike pindhai
Kalo megh jano sajilo re.

It describes :

Golden belle dresses up
in multi-colored shroud
As if forms a dark cloud.
First, a sari called gangajal she wears
When placed on hand the sari wavers,
On water, one with it becomes the sari
On earth, the ants away it caitt.
The belle looks at the sari with it on body laid
If it does not flatter her taste,
gives to her servant-maid.
As if forms a dark cloud.

In such songs, where the words are the main element, this kind of structural growth is plain to see. But there is another kind in which the tune is the essential thing from the first; the words are casual and changeable. The tune expresses some primal human emotion. A village mother weeps for her son. She may cry her sorrow in whatever words come to her mind, but the sorrow is the same, and the rise and fall of her voice is like this :

Ore amar ma re ma
Amai chaire tui kothai geli re
Mare ma.

It wails :
O my mother, my mother!
Whither are you gone leaving me alone?
O my mother, my mother!

There the tune is monotonous, confined to a single line, but the next one is more varied because two lines are rhymed together:

Bela gelo sandha holo o hoilo re
Tarai jalo bati
Na jani abalar bandhu ashben kata rati re
Rat tui ja re ja pohaiya.
It implores :

The day wears off, the dusk fall
Kindle sharp the light;
God knows helpless maid's friend arrives how late at night.
O night! ye close, ye pass.

Notice how its cadences are rounded and curved, and how by the two lines the monotony is slightly broken. Next, three or four lines are rhymed together and the tune gains in variety as they rise and fall :

Amar galar har khule nelo
Ogo Lalite
Amar har pare ar ki lav habe
O jar pran bandhu nai Brojete
Bandhu jadi ashe deshe
O Rai Krishna soge prun tajilo
Kalidaher kulete.

Amar Galar Har Music & Lyrics by Jasim Uddin, Singer: Sabina Yesmin

Amar Galar Har - Music and Lyric by Poet Jasim Uddin

Amar galar Har Khule Ne Lyrics and Music by Jasim Uddin, Singer: Ferdaus Ara

It mourns:

My necklace is unhcoked and taken away,
O Beauty!
Why would I wear the necklace again?
When my bosom friend is away from the
world.
(You) Tell my friend, when she comes
Radha has lost her life
In agony of separation from Krishna.

Bhawai Songs of North Bengal

In the northern part of the Province there is a third variety of tune,' which is a long chant, that is suddenly and unexpectedly broken as if the singer had gone out of tune and corrected himself most artistically ;

O ki Garial Bhai

Oki Garial Bhai

O ki garialbhai ..
Kata robo ami pather dige chaya re.

It sings inquiringly :
O dear cartman!
How long would I keep on waiting for
his arrival?

Folk-song is the collective creation of a whole people

You cannot calculate the age of a song from the shape of its tune. Even today the one-line song is composed afresh in our villages; and a well-developed melody may be centuries old. Whether ill tune or wording, a folk-song is neither old nor new. From day .to day it changes a little, by the additions and alterations' of different singers, and always it remains true to the ancient pattern. This is what makes it a folk-song-the collective creation of a whole people. This is the course of development from simplicity to complexity. But please bear in mind that I am giving

Folk-music of all parts of the world. Here, for instance, is one which may be compared with gipsy songs:

Nandolal Bose

Prano Shaki re Oi Shon kadamo Tale Music and Lyric by Jasim Uddin, Singer: Abbasuddin Ahmed

Prano sa:khi re ..
Oi Shone kadamba talai banshi bajai ke
Banshi bajai ke re sakhi bansi bajai ke
Amar 'galar har khuile e debo tare ina de.
Jar bansi eman she ba keman janish jadi bal
Tora koris nako chhal
Amar man bale tar ba,nsi jan amar chokher jal!.

It prays :

O my dearest mate!
Hark! there who plays on flute under the Kadamba tree;
Bring him to me, I give my necklace to thee,
Who plays on flute so (sweet), how is he,
Tell me.
Pray don't try any tricks,
My mind feels, my tears his flute appreciates.

The tunes can be adopted go from country to country.

In these swift-measure songs the tunes themselves are universally easy to understand. Because the words are predominant, a foreigner who does not know the language cannot enjoy them for very long at a stretch; but the tunes can be adopted go from country to country.

In the long measured songs, on the other hand, the cadences are half-curved, long-curved, rounded, quarter-curved and full-curved. Where European tunes run in straight lines the tunes of East Bengal flow in curve's. The tune, not the words, is the main thing, and so those long-measure songs can be understood by a foreigner; only he has to train his ear to their simple cadences.

One thins is worth remarking here. I have heard these songs sung to European audiences by our best singers, and although the audience liked them in a way, they could not enjoy them with full understanding. And yet when a European gave his own rendering of them, though he left our something that a Bengali ear would want, the European audience responded with full enthusiasm. In the same way, it is easier for me to enjoy songs, a European ear might find the rendering of which imperfect. Just as literature has to be slightly changed in translation, and only then it will yield its beauty to the foreign reader, so it appears tunes may be translated into foreign idiom.

Beutiful East Bengal, in song they invoke their God

Our country of East Bengal is very beautiful. So many poets-many makers of tunes, are lying under the shade of the trees, under the roofs of the farmers' broken-down cottages, in the depth of the forest, in the shadowy corners of the jute fields, in a thousand moods and a thousand postures to paint the hopes and aspirations, the sorrows and the happiness of the land. There is not a single village where there is not a poet-not a single little community without its singer; and their songs pour forth incessantly as the bird-music echoes in the breeze.

zainul abedin In our country the leaves of the trees and the changing movement of the paddy-fields make a colourful embroidery, and always there is pageant of green-vivid green, cool green, dim green, bright green, dull green, cloudy green, green that is blue almost to blackness; shade after shade of entrancing green such as cannot be found anywhere else on earth. In the folk-tunes of the country the greenness speaks.

How many tunes shall I name? How many festivals shall I describe? In the tragic song of Imam Hussain, in gipsy songs, baul songs, murshida songs, rain songs, in songs innumerable the lovers call those they love, in song they invoke their God, in song they draw down the elemental powers and compel the clouds into the sky.

Unmarried girls sing the rain-song from house to house, and it is like the song of 1'11 sing you one:

Deya re tumi adhure adhare namo
Gharer langalghare railo
Haila chasha rode mailo
Deya re tumi adhare adhare namo
Kalo megh sajilo, kalo kai tor urilo
Dea re tumi adhare adhare namo.

It invokes:
O rain! ye, fall ceaselessly,
Ploughs at home lie idle,
Burn in sun tillers of soil,
Ye fall ceaselessly, 0 rain!
Dark cloud forms, black pigeons flatter up
O rain! ye fall ceaselessly.

The songs of the countryside are the voice of the river.

East Bengal is a country of rivers. Like tendrils of a creeper, or like the ornaments hanging on a woman's limbs, the sweeping curves and half curves and straight lines of innumerable Rivers have traced a network over fields. The rivers like beloved neighbours stretch our their rippling throats and sing the accomplishment to our country songs. The songs of the countryside are the voice of the river. Who is he, the unknown, unvisible maker of the village tunes, stroking the rivers with his soft-fingered wavy-hands as a player strokes the strings of an instrument, creating the many-coloured songs of Bengal in the batiali tunes. There is no village where the river is not .within two miles. For more than six months of the year the floods are out, and, in the rainy. season there is no work to be done. The cultivators fill up their leisure with an endless variety of folk-songs, and singing parities tour by boat from village to village.

In this season number of people take to their boats and ferry goods from place to place, from one country to another. Far away from kith and kin they sail their boats down the swift wild waterways; before them are the everlasting waves, above them is the vast limitless sky. Subconsciously they are filled with the mystery of the eternal, and a thousand questions rise in their minds. The everlasting waters become the a path of life, and the small boat is the man's own life as he floats on his endless journey. As the river changes, so do the tunes change that rise to his lips. Here he is launching his boat with a song:

Nao ano re bai nao ano re
Rajani prbhat holo rebhai
Nao ano re.

Nao ano re Music and Lyrics Jasim Uddin
It calls :
Bring the boat, dear friend, bring the boat
The night is passing out
Bring the boat, dear friend, bring the boat.

Now the boat is floating down the river. In whose boat has he come and whither has he come? The questions pass through his mind, and the tune min.gles with the lazy movement of the boat under sail:

Nodir Kul Nai Bhatiali - Lyrics and Music by Jasim Uddin, Singer Indromohon Rajbankshi

Nodir Kul Nai Bhatiali - Lyrics and Music by Jasim Uddin, Singer: Abbasuddin Ahmed

Nadir kul nai kinara nai re
O ami kon kul hote kon kule jabo
Kahare sudhai re
Opare megher ghata kanak bijuli chhata
Majhe nadhi bahe sai sai re
Ami ai horilam sonar chhabi
Abar theki nai re.

It sings;

The river has no bank, no shore
Which bank shall I leave, to which I go?
From whom this shall I know;
The cloud arrays itself on the other bank, golden flashes paint,
The river speeds along under the pressure of rain.
I see a picture golden I see it no more again.

Hashem khan He begins to sing again. In our river-tangled country we call across the water to a man on the far bank:

O rangila nayer manjhi
It calls:
Boatman of the colored craft, O!

Hear, how this cry has mingled with the next tune:

O Rangila naer manjhi
O tumi ai ghate lagaiya nao
Nighum katha kaiya juo suni.

Bandhu Rangila Music & Lyrics by Jasim Uddin, Singer: S. D. Burman

It entreats: Boatman of the coloured craft, O!
(You) touch at this place To open mind to me.
The boat is passing slowly. Listen to the tune:

Unur jhunur baye nao
Amar ni haila batase re
Murshid ruilum tor ashe.

The storm comes, One boatman is shouting to warn another. "The storm is coming.

"Pashime sajilo megh re
Deyay delore dak
Amar chirilo hailer panas
Noukai khailo pak.

It warns:

A cloud gathers in the west
There roars it out, Rope of my boat's helm breaks
And goes reeling the boat.

Then the rain descends and attacks the boat; he must rescue his boat from the strom.

"Hail, the seven Preceptors!
Hail, God and the Prophet!"
He pulls on the oar with all his force:

Omajhi re
Jhar tuphane chulao tari husiar
husiar ho
kato hangor kurnir parshi moder
kalopanir dhau
Darer ghaye phanil phona gutia chole sao
Meghe agun dianache kar pagli meye
Se je chira joyer path dekhaya
chalchhe age dheye
kato hangor kurnir parshi moder
kalopanir dhau
Darer ghaye phanil phona gutia chole sao
Meghe agun dianache kar pagli meye
Se je chira joyer path dekhaya
chalchhe age dheye

It alerts:

Boatmen O!
Be on guard as you row in high wind adn storms,
Sharks and crocodiles our neighbours;
And black water's billows
Hold frothy crests down beaten by oars.
In the midst of cloud whose wild girl dances?
She leads, she guides us to success.

Then the storm has gone by and the boat is saved. Journey's end comes dimly into sight. Listen to that moment:

Amar lauku re bai
Dole lauka re bhai
Dole lauka Allajir batashe bai re.

It rejoices :

My boat, dear friend,
It rolls, dear friend,
Rolls in God's wind, friend,

So the journey goes on, and life goes on, and each song is a change in the river, in the emotion of the songs.

Tagore patronised others and he himself collected a large number of folklore materials from his vast estate of East Bengal, including Bangladesh. He himself wrote : "When I was at Selaidah, I would always keep close contact with the Bauls (mystic folk singers) and have discussion with them, and it was fact that I infused tunes of Baul songs into many of my own songs".

Many people say that 'Tagore used numerous folklore themes in many of his poems, songs, dramas, novels and short stories. Other scholars, who made important contribution to folklore were Upendra Kishore Roy Choudhury : Toontooni Pal (1910 Book on Toontooni) and Mitra Majumder Takore: Thakur Mar Jhuli (1906 Grandmother Stories), Monsur Uddin (collector of Baul songs), Jashim Uddin (who was famous for his folklore themes in dramas and poetries).

The third phase of folklore movement began in Dhaka, then East Bengal, in the year 1938, when the Eastern Mymensingh Literary Society was established. This promoted the collection and study of folklore. Folklore activities were, however, much accelerated when the then government established the Bangla Academy in Dhaka in 1955 to promote research work on Bengali language and literature and collected, preserved and published folklore materials. Folklore candidates, appointed by the academy, worked in regions rich in folklore. As a result, folklore materials of high quality poured in on an unending stream. So far, the Bangla Academy has published many books on folklore.

Bengali ballads which are called Gatha or Geetika in Bengali are one of the earliest variety of folksongs. The dates of origin of Bengali ballads will safely go to up to the Middle Ages, if not earlier. Divergent opinions have been expressed as to the origin of ballads. There are two contending groups : (1) communalistic, and (2) individualistic.

The first group saw in ballads a continuing traditions from the primitive ages and thought that these were made by a kind of communal improvisations for communal recreation. Later, critic suggested that people were too indefinite, too disorganised for such concerted efforts, and that ballads were composed under the direction of a leader who brought the necessary discipline in songs and who functioned as the main organiser and guide.

According to the critics, after an individual ballad was composed, it passed on from people to people, community to community through oral traditions. In the process some were changed, improved and sometimes even deteriorated. This individualistic theory has been accepted by the scholars at both home and abroad.

Behind ever art is a man, behind the man is the race and behind the race is the social and natural environment and these influences are sure to be reflected on folklore. Bengali ballads give us an idea of the Bengali society in the Middle Ages, its joy and sorrows, laughter and tears. Bangladesh is the land of rivers -- almost all villages are linked with rivers. There is a proverb which says, "There is not a single village without a river or a rivulet and a folk poet or a minstrel".

The struggle for existence was not as hard in Middle Ages as it is today and the minstrels and folk poets had ample opportunity to enjoy nature and pass care-free-time in composing songs and stories. Moreover, they were always patronised by the local feudal lords.

It was, of course, Islam that gave the highest acceleration to the development of the Bengali ballads. The Turks conquered Bengal at the beginning of the 13th century. Muslims brought with them a huge store of Persian literature.

The low-caste Hindus for the first time in their life had the opportunity to talk and mix with the conquering race. They saw that there were no barriers to caste and creed among Muslims and that all men were equal in Islam. In due course, the influence of the Persian romances reached the remote corner of the country. Gradually, the Hindu society also came to know of this and humanism like the south wind blew over the literature of Bengal. Even though these stories and songs were composed earlier, they were unfortunately collected from the oral tradition only by the second decade of the 20th century. It is quite obvious that these stories underwent a great change.

Earlier the poets were patronised by the feudal lords, but in the later period probably when the poets lost their patrons in the British period, they became the "property of the masses rather than the classes". May be, for this reason the quality of the folk stories and songs, composed in the later period, deteriorated. Many stories and songs have been collected till now. The ballads are usually sung in accompaniment with tabors, drums, and other folk instruments. Ballad stories are sung by a leader who is called "Gayen' and he has a group of associate singers called 'Paile' who join in the chorus in illustrating the episodes.

There are innumerable varieties of folk songs in the riverine Bangladesh which are sung by different cultural groups in different parts of the country. The most popular variety of songs can be divided into many different classes.

The first class of songs can be divided into "Work songs" or "Occupational songs". These songs include harvest songs, which are sung at the time of harvest or cultivation; songs of the bullockcart drivers or palan-quin-bearers sung at the time of carrying passengers from one place to another; songs sung by labourers when they built roofs of a house; 'sari-gaan', sung by boatmen in the month of monsoon, at the time of boat race, etc.

Both Kavi and Jari sometimes go beyond the limit of their particular subject and in the course of singing introduces modern topics or amusing national and local events. Sometimes when ritual singers indulge in personal attacks through the exchange of sharp wits, the audience bursts into laughter.

We see that all the folk songs and stories of Bangladesh inform us about the then society. It depicts clearly how the people used to think, their customs, and what the principles they used to follow. Through all the folk materials collected over the years we can learn more about our country's history and tradition. We learn that Bangladesh has rich cultural and folklore heritage, which may be compared with any other country of the world rich in folklore. Since folklore has already been accepted as a social, cultural and ethnic study, Bangladeshi Folklore will also have a distinct place in the study.

bede (gypsy- girl)

Bedermeye- - Jasim Uddin's famous musical and drama on oppressed and neglected gypsy folk: Part I

Bedermeye- - Jasim Uddin's famous musical and drama on oppressed and neglected gypsy folk: Part 2

Snake Charmer / Babu Selam Lyric and Music Jasim Uddin, dance by Shibli & Nipa

Babu Selam Bare Bar A gypsy song Music and Lyrics by Jasim Uddin

O babu, many salams to you
my name is Goya the Snakecharmer,
My home is the Padma river.
We catch birds
we live on birds
There is no end to our happiness,
For we trade,
With the jewel on the Cobra's head.

"We cook on one bank,
We eat at another
We have no homes,
The whole world is our home,
All men are our brothers
We look for them
In every door….."
(Jasim Uddin)

Bangladesh snake charmers

Bangladesh has an estimated 500,000 snake charmers, who rove the country like gypsies or live in riverboats. Some 5,000 have settled with their families in Porabari village, 32 km (20 miles) from Dhaka, where every household boasts a basket full of snakes, even though few charmers are teaching their children their art.

"This is not because we no longer love snakes or dislike to play them for a living," said Alamgir Hossain, 45, who holds the title of "sorporaj" or "snake king", the highest honor in the community. "I grew up with the snakes, played with cobras, and, maybe you can say, romanced with them," said the father of six.

"So did most members of the clan. They play snakes to crowds of villagers for money. But those days have changed." Now many of Porabari's charmers have taken other professions with more predictable incomes, like pulling rickshaws or growing rice and vegetables. Most send their children to school. Urbanization, deforestation and other environmental changes have also decreased Bangladesh's snake population. Even though the government has banned the killing of snakes, villagers often kill serpents that have bitten or killed others.

Hossain won his title after many years of devotion, practice and training in Bangladesh and India's Assam state. Today, few have the patience or inclination to do the same. He said he was one of only six living "sorporaj" in the country -- five of his predecessors were killed by snake bites.

In Porabari, children play with snakes without fear, draping them around their necks like garlands. Female snake charmers often sell talismans and "medical" advice to illiterate villagers. Male charmers are often called upon to cure people who have been bitten by poisonous snakes and are seen as "ujhas" or paramedics.

Hossain said Porabari's charmers make most of their money from selling snakes to the other charmers who descend on the village for the weekly snake market. "I try to buy nearly 100 snakes in each consignment, for 400 or 500 taka ($6-7) each, and then sell them for a minimum profit," Hossain said. "But high quality snakes, like the king cobra, are rarely found and cost nearly 5,000 taka a piece."

Despite his elevated position in the community, Hossain said he had no intention to allow his children to follow in his "risky" footsteps. "But we cannot live without snakes," he said. "We love them like we love our children."(Masud Karim, Reuter, June, 1, 2007) ($1=69 taka)
Members of a bede (river gypsy) community show a cobra spreading its hood at a human chain rally jointly organised by the community and Grambangla Unnayan Committee at Shahbag in the city yesterday. The rally was held to press home the demand of education for gypsies' children.

Although in most Bangladeshi villages there is some local snake charmer, the main snake artistes, however, are the wandering snake charmers of Bangladesh, the Bedes. It turns out, there are three types of sub-professions within the Bedes. The groups are “Shapure”, “Sowdagar” and “Misisganni”. The group that is most heard of, of course are the Shapures. Some of these Shapures make their living by catching and selling snakes. Other Shapures train their snakes a range of tricks so that they can become entertainers.

Nowadays, snake charmers are far less prevalent in Bangladesh than they were before, and this is not surprising. Even though their numbers of dwindling, plenty of professional snake charmers can still be found around the Bangshi river in Savar, the Dhaleswari in Munshiganj and the Padma.

A gripping saga Palli Kabi Jasim Uddin's "Beder Meye" staged

Padatik Natya Sangsad staged Palli Kabi Jasim Uddin's timeless tale Beder Meye at Bangladesh Mahila Samity Auditorium recently. The play is directed by Irene Parvin Lopa. As the title implies, the play is the saga of a bede girl. Named Champabati, her life changes forever when she is abducted by the morol (village headman). Despite fervent appeals, her husband (Gaya), fails to rescue her. He then leaves the village and marries another girl. Subsequent events lead to a dramatic denouement.

The cast comprises Wahidul Islam, Mominul Haque Dipu, Saida Samsi Ara, Shafiqur Rahman Sagor and Arefa Sultana Lina, among others (Daily Star, June 30, 2006). Beder Meye is the 28th production of Padatik.

Song

5. 1. Songs of Jasim Uddin

Nishite Jaio Phulobane.. Music & Lyrics by Jasim Uddin, Singer: S. D. Burman

Dhire se Janain hindi from Nishite jaio: Music & Lyrics by Jasim Uddin, Singer: S. D. Burman

Patrioc Songs

Gypsy Songs

Snake Charmer / Babu Selam Lyric and Music Jasim Uddin, dance by Shibli & Nipa

Babu Selam Bare Bar A gypsy song Music and Lyrics by Jasim Uddin

Jasimuddins folksongs delight the audience

F O L K L O R E R E S E A R C H I N E A S T P A K I S T A N BY ASHRAF SIDDIQUI and A. S. M. ZAHURUL HAQUE Indiana University, USA

Jasimuddins Asmani released

Asmanider dekhte jadi tomara sabe chao Rahimuddir chhotao barhi Rasulpure jao. If you want to see Asmani, you can go to Rahimuddi’s house in Rasulpur –
wrote Pallikabi Jasimuddin in his famous poem on Asmani, a poverty-ridden rural girl in Rasulpur. Asmani is still alive and now 110 year old. A music company called Sweet Song Products released a music album titled ‘Asmani’ sung by Shamim Afroj Shima at Shaukat Osman Auditorium of Central Public Library on Monday.
The organisers arranged the programme to provide financial help to Asmani, the protagonist of the Pallikabi’s poem of the same title. Managing director of the music company Ridwana Afrin Sumi in her address of welcome said that they want to help Asmani of Jasimuddin’s poem who is still languishing in poverty. ‘We want to help her by giving a part of the sale money from the music album,’ she added.
Former secretary Syed Marghub Murshed was present as chief guest while Mohammad Shamsul Huda, senior vice-president (sales and marketing) of satellite television channel ATN; Mohammad Saidul Haque, executive director of Human Rights Review Society; Selim H Rahman, managing director of Hatil Complex Limited; Nargis Banu, director of Prashika and Imtiaj Mahmud Bhuiyan, chairman of Intellect Trade Link were present as special guests. Rezaul Karim, managing director of Organic Health Care Limited presided over the function. The speakers appreciated the initiatives of the music company in helping Asmani. They said that sufferings of this elderly rural woman were passionately described in the poem by Jasimuddin. The readers of this poem still feel for her but many do not know of her present situation.‘The music company has rediscovered the lady and presented her through the songs in front of the whole nation,’ they added.
Music director Lokman Hakim conducted the programme, followed by a solo performance by the singer.Shima started the soiree singing Asmani, the title song of the album.

Some Remake Songs

Poet Jasim Uddin, Faridpur Region Folk, Bangladesh - 2v

Kobi Jasim Uddin, Faridpur Region Bhatiali (Folk), Bangladesh - 4

Kobi Jasim Uddin, Faridpur Region Folk, Bangladesh - 3

A Tribute to Poet Jasimuddin Bangla Song

Nodir Kul Nai

O Amar Dorodi remix by Sree

PROTIDAN - By Jasim Uddin Recited by Shimul Mustafa

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5.2 Old Nazrul Geeti- 78 rpm recorder in 30's

Born into a poor Muslim family, Nazrul received religious education and worked as a muezzin at a local mosque. He learned of poetry, drama, and literature while working with theatrical groups. After serving in the British Indian Army, Nazrul established himself as a journalist in Kolkata (then Calcutta). He assailed the British Raj in India and preached revolution through his poetic works, such as 'Bidrohi' (The Rebel) and 'Bhangar Gaan' (The Song of Destruction), as well as his publication 'Dhumketu' (The Comet). His impassioned activism in the Indian independence movement often led to his imprisonment by British authorities. While in prison, Nazrul wrote the 'Rajbandir Jabanbandi' (Deposition of a Political Prisoner). Exploring the life and conditions of the downtrodden masses of India, Nazrul worked for their emancipation.

Nazrul's writings explore themes such as love, freedom, and revolution; he opposed all bigotry, including religious and gender. Throughout his career, Nazrul wrote short stories, novels, and essays but is best-known for his poems, in which he pioneered new forms such as Bengali ghazals. Nazrul wrote and composed music for his nearly 4,000 songs (including gramophone records) collectively known as Nazrul geeti (Nazrul songs), which are widely popular today. At the age of 43 (in 1942) he began suffering from an unknown disease, losing his voice and memory. Eventually diagnosed as Pick's disease, it caused Nazrul's health to decline steadily and forced him to live in isolation for many years. Invited by the Government of Bangladesh, Nazrul and his family moved to Dhaka in 1972, where he died four years later, in 1976.

In films, we can found Kazi Nazrul Islam as a film director, storyteller, musician, lyricist and actor. Nazrul debuted his film career through the film titled 'Dhruba.' Besides direction, he also acted and directed the music of the film. Then he has had also written story and directed of the films 'Patalpuri,' 'Gora,' 'Bidyapati,' 'Shapurey,' 'Dikshul,' 'Nandini,' 'Chaurangi' and others. Therefore, he also set up film related institution Bengal Tiger Pictures. However, many films had been made on the basis of the written story of Kazi Nazrul Islam.

ANGUR BALA ....OLD SONG.... AMAR JABAR SHOMAY

Nishi Bhor Holo - Angurbala 78 rpm

Nahay Nahay Prio .. Angur Bala

Kmono Daki--- Angur Bala 78 rpm

Ganguli Mor Ahato..- Angur Bala- Nazrul Geeti.

Bidayya sandha Ahsilo, Angur Bala

Ato Jal Kajol Choke- Angur Bala

Aashile E Bhanga Ghare- Legendor ANGUR BALA

Firoza Begum - Ogo Priyo tobo Gaan

Firoza Begum - Mora Aar Jonome

Angur Bala sings Classic O Sajna

Others

Ghor bhulano surey - Nazrul geeti

chowk gelo- nazrul sangeet by Firoza Begum

Nazrul Geeti - Amar Jabar Shomoy Holo

Brojo Gopi Khaley Hori... sabiha Mahboob

Nazrul geeti

1973- pg hospital dhaka Nazrul was a very dear friend of Jasim Uddin. Nazrul visted Jasim Uddin's parent house at Village Ambikapur, Faridpur twice in 1930s. Kazi Nazrul Islam, popularly known as rebel poet (vidrohi kobi), was born on the 25th May 1898 at Churulia in the district of Burdwan, West Bengal, India. He was an exceptional talented person in Bangla literature. This patriot, poet, composer writer, political figure or the myriad minded man edited a politico-cultural magazine "Dhumketu".

When still a school student in his teens Nazrul joined the newly recruited Bengali regiment (1916) and sent to Mesopotamia some months before the armistice. The regiment was not given a chance to face battle but all the same Nazrul got his fill of the fighting gusto which later-found expression in poetic effusion and warmth.

His first two significant poems, Pralayollas (Exhilaration at the Final Dissolution) and Vidrohi (Rebellion) appeared early in 1922 and his first book of poem Agnibina (The lute of fire) was out before the year was over. The book was received with an enthusiasm never experienced in India before or since. After he joined the Kollol group and wrote mostly deft and pungent verse and songs galore.

Nazrul Islam wrote a good numbers of valuable poems, songs, novels, dramas. He had a good command on classic Indian song. He could sing, recite and act with considerable proficiency.

Nazrul was an emotional soul, but his emotion was unstable and volatile. Those who came in personal contact with him were moved by his irresistible enthusiasm and sincerity. But his literary output falls far short of his merit, except the early poems in Agnibina. After Agnibina his best known books of poems and songs are Dolonchampa(1923), Biser Bansi (The poisonous flute, 1924), Bhangar Gan (Songs of break-up, 1924), Puber Haoya (The east wind 1925) and Bulbul(1928).

In Nazrul’s works we find that the poet tried to establish women’s long cherished freedom in the conservative society, which gave his creations an added dimension. But unfortunately, because of the poet’s prolonged illness, we failed to get more from this literary genius. This is the high time to conserve the poet’s works, especially the authentic musical notations of his songs.’

Dr Ashraf Siddiqie, a renowned folk exponent said, ‘The Institute seeks to preserve and spread Nazrul’s songs and literature. Up to the present, we have preserved and brought together about 2,000 old gramophone records of Nazrul songs. On the poet’s 29th death anniversary, we bring out an audio CD titled Padmer Dheu Re which is a recollection of the old Nazrul songs in authentic form, by the great artistes like Indu Bala, Angur Bala, Sachin Deb Burman and others of the poet’s own time. We need to publish various publications on Nazrul too.

Abdul Hye Shikdar said, ‘We require Kazi Nazrul Islam’s songs and writings for our development as a nation, and the institute is there to nurture our culture through Nazrul’s works. But there is need for discussions and seminars on the National Poet. His songs and poems need to be made more popular. Awards should be given to those who have done exceptional work on Nazrul (New Age, August 29, 2005)..

Nazrul as Music Director- Film Dhruba

nazrul durbah When the National Poet of Bangladesh Kazi Nazrul Islam appeared on the literary stage in Calcutta in the early 1920s with a bang he instantly drew the enthusiastic attention of the appreciative readers of Bengal. As a versatile genius Nazrul traversed almost all the branches of literature, such as, poetry, drama, music, novels etc. Nazrul had another identity; he was closely related to the movies. He was a film director, dialogue writer, music composer and music director. He worked both in Bangla and Hindi films. He worked in more than a dozen films.

In 1931 Nazrul was offered a prestigious position of music director at Pioneer Films Company. Before Nazrul, no Bangalee Muslim glorified such a respectable post in the world of cinema of Indian subcontinent. Nazrul was related to cinema from 1930 to 1941. During this time he worked in more than 12 movies, such as, Dhruba (1934), Patalpuri (1935), Bidyapati (Bangla version, 1938), Bidyapati (Hindi version, 1938), Nandini (1941) etc.

1933 was a remarkable year for the Bangla cinema. Nazrul's first movie Dhruba began to be prepared. On the first day of 1934 Dhruba was released in Kolkatta. In this cinema Nazrul was the director, songwriter, music composer, singer, and actor. In this movie there were two directors; Nazrul and Saityendranath Dev. It was produced and released by Pioneer Films.

Dhruba included many melodious songs- as many as 18. Among these 18 songs 17 were composed by Nazrul himself, and only one song was composed by Girish Chandra Ghose, a prominent dramatist, who wrote the story of Dhruba. Master Prabodh sang six songs, Angur Bala sang four, Nazrul sang three songs. Parul Bala sang two songs. There were some duets also; Kazi Nazrul Islam and Master Prabodh sang a duet, Angur Bala and Master Prabodh sang another duet song.

It is unknown to the researchers, yet today, as to who was the singer of the song which was written by Girish Chandra Ghose. But it is known to us that Nazrul was the music composer of that song. In Dhruba, Nazrul portrayed the role of Narod.

The Story of Dhruba is just like a fairy tale. In ancient time there was a king named Uttanpad. The name of his wife was Suneeti who was a very pious lady. Everyday she used to worship the idle of Vishnu. So god generously gave them all kinds of wealth. The only lacking of the family was that this couple had no child who would be the next successor to the kingdom. Suneeti, who was extremely devoted to her husband, wanted the king to marry again. Accordingly the king married Suruchee, a beautiful princes. Many days had passed, but Suruchee also failed to give birth to a child. Suruchee was very beautiful but also very cunning. Afterwards, she conspired and the king exiled Suneeti, the first queen, to a forest. One night the king dreamt that his ancestors ordered him to offer meat, from Mrigoya (hunting), to deities. That is why one day the king went a-hunting.

But there rose a terrible rainstorm and the king lost his way. At last he begged shelter standing at the door of a hut. He was given shelter in that hut which was actually the dwelling place of the exiled queen Suneeti. After five years Suneeti came to the touch of her god. In that forest Suneeti gave birth to a child, a boy. The boy was named Dhruba. Day by day Dhruba began to grow as a prince in the hut of the forest. His mother informed him that king Uttanpad was his father.

When Dhruba was only five, once he went to the palace of his father and begged shelter and clothes from his father. The king could recognize him and took him to his arms. The king wanted him to ascend the throne but the second queen Suruchee was in the way. Dhruba came back to his mother crying. At long last the king Uttampad brought the queen Suneeti and their son Dhruba to the place.

In the film Dhruba, Nazrul played the role of Narod. Other central characters were Dhruba - Master Prabodh, king Uttanpad - Joy Narayan, first queen Suneeti - Angur Bala, second queen Suruchee - Sharifa. Nazrul's Dhruba is a milestone in the history of Bengali cinema.

1933 was a remarkable year for the Bangla cinema. Nazrul's first movie Dhruba began to be prepared. On the first day of 1934 Dhruba was released in Kolkatta. In this cinema Nazrul was the director, songwriter, music composer, singer, and actor. In this movie there were two directors; Nazrul and Saityendranath Dev. It was produced and released by Pioneer Films.

Dhruba included many melodious songs- as many as 18. Among these 18 songs 17 were composed by Nazrul himself, and only one song was composed by Girish Chandra Ghose, a prominent dramatist, who wrote the story of Dhruba. Master Prabodh sang six songs, Angur Bala sang four, Nazrul sang three songs. Parul Bala sang two songs. There were some duets also; Kazi Nazrul Islam and Master Prabodh sang a duet, Angur Bala and Master Prabodh sang another duet song. In the film Dhruba, Nazrul played the role of Narod. Other central characters were Dhruba - Master Prabodh, king Uttanpad - Joy Narayan, first queen Suneeti - Angur Bala, second queen Suruchee - Sharifa. Nazrul's Dhruba is a milestone in the history of Bengali cinema.

Angur Bala

Angurbala had recorded about 300 songs for the Gramophone Company of which 50 were Nazrul songs. "The most interesting experience was when I met Kazi Shaheb for the first time," went on the legendary artiste. Recalling those eventful days, Angur said, "We waited impatiently to meet him. We thought that he would be a bearded man, dressed up in alkhella, with a toopi on his head. However, we were charmed to see a completely different person attired in a gerua panjabi, a yellow silk turban and strings of beads around his neck. A creative genius of his stature never seemed distant.

"Kazi Shaheb would compose tunes focusing on the speciality of the artiste. Sometimes he would just explain the notations and then say in his usual manner 'Angur, it's now up to you to add the sweet angur (grape) flavour of your voice.' That is how I remember Nazrul," reminisced Angurbala.

Amar Jabar Bela - Angur Bala - Old Nazrul Song

Biday Sandhya Aasilo: Angur Bala

Eto Jal O Kajal_Angur Bala_Nazrulgeeti

Nishi Bhor Holo_Angur Bala.

Aamar Jabar Samay Holo Dao Biday_Angurbala Devi

Nahe Nahe Priyo_Angur Bala

Kemone Rakhi Aankhi Bari_Angur Bala

Gaan Guli Mor_Angur Bala

Aashile E Bhanga Ghare_Angur Bala.

Indubala Devi... Thumari Tilang

Angur Bala was basically a stage actress and a singer par excellence. She learnt singing from Amulya Majumdar, Jeet Prasad, Ram Prasad Mitra and Ustad Jahiruddin Khan. At the age of 8, she appeared in stage. In the mean time her first disc was released from HMV under the supervision of Mr. Cooper. She became a singer star within a very short span of time. During this time she was introduced to Kazi Najrul Islam who then joined the gramophone company as a trainer. Under Kazi Najrul Islam’s supervision Angur Bala recorded her first Nazrul Geeti. Parallel to her singing career, Angur Bala continuded her stage acting. Nripen Basu introduced her to Bengal Theatrical Company where she played the lead role in the drama “ Muktar Mukhti” and was highly acclaimed. She acted for a long time in Minerva Theatre. Thereafter she joined the Star Theatre. The important productions of Star theatre she was associated with were “Poysha Putra”, “Chandidas”, "Mamata Shakti”, “Bidrohini” and “Siraj-ud-doula”. She made her film debut in the 1933 film “Jamuna Pulinay” directed by Priyonath Ganguly. Her important films were “Dhruba”, “Abartan”, “India”, “Khona” and “Debjan”. She also acted in several Hindi and Urdu films like “Nasib Ka Chakkar, “Maa ki Mamata”, “Char Darbesh” etc.

She received D.Litt. form Kalyani University. She also received Natak Academy Award. She died in Kolkata on 7th January, 1984.

"Can you explain what a ghazal is?" questioned Arjumand Banu. While I was looking for words, she explained in simple words, "Ghazals originated from Persian poetry based on love. It was Kazi Nazrul Islam who introduced Bangla ghazals that created a massive impact in the music scene. The songs with an exclusive pattern and melody took the music lovers by storm. This was in the year 1926. Nazrul was then hardly 27." There is no end to learning, I thought to myself. That day is firmly etched in my mind.

It was in the same year ('74) that the virtuoso singer Angurbala visited Dhaka. She was the first to record two of Nazrul's ghazals Eto jaal O kajal chokhey and Bhuli kemoney in 1929 for the Gramophone Company that stirred the music aficionados to great heights. Never had they heard such songs with such passionate lyrics and tunes. Surely Nazrul's genius was unparalleled.

From basuuudun Channel Youtube

89 video music etc.- basuuddin Channel - YouTube

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5.3 Jasim Uddin: AFC’s First Collection of Bengali Folksong, Indian Folklife, by JENNIFER CUTTING, Folklife Specialist, and STEPHEN WINICK, Writer-Editor

In 1958, the American Folklife Center (AFC) Archive acquired its first recording of Bengali folksong. Fifty years later, AFC repatriated this material to Bangladesh, sending a copy to the Folk Culture Museum at Jasim Uddin House in Faridpur.

The repatriation reflected the American Folklife Center’s ongoing and evolving commitment to the preservation and stewardship of intangible cultural heritage, and to providing communities of origin with access to their materials.

The field recording in question features Bengali folklorist and poet Jasim Uddin (1904-1976), known in Bengali as “Pallikabi,” or “The People’s Poet.” It contains ten performances of Uddin singing traditional Bengali folksongs, and providing commentary and English translations for the collectors.

The Jasim Uddin Recording: a Summary

Uddin organized his recording session according the life-cycle customs of Bangladesh. Hence, his fi rst selection is what he terms a “birth song,” and this is followed by a children’s song.

The latter demonstrates that Uddin was a traditional singer in his everyday life; upon hearing the recording, Uddin’s son, Dr. Jamal Anwar, commented: “My father used to sing [this] to me. I still remember the song….”

The third piece is among the most interesting selections. It is a rain song, which, Uddin says, unmarried girls would sing while marching in a procession from house to house in times of drought. Interestingly, Uddin described this custom more fully in his poetry:

Into this village came a band of girls
At such a season of dearth;
Singing the song of the marriage of rain,
Th at rain might fall on the earth.

Five girls in a chain, five painted flowers,
But she is without compare,
Who stands in the centre in colour of gold,
The fairest of the fair. 1

Uddin then sings a rhythmic work song, which he states is for tasks “like pulling a boat for a long distance”;

two war songs for “when the head man of the village is exciting his comrades to fi ght”; and a narrative song, “in which the King’s daughter is dressing herself.”

Following the narrative piece, Uddin sings a love song, and gives a full translation into English, including the following lines:

“Oh, my beloved friend, had I known that there would be so much pain…I wouldn’t have come under the branch of the cottonwood tree, and I wouldn’t have seen your beautiful face. If you come to my house, people will scold thee. But if you do not like to, don’t come to my house, but come to my neighbor’s house and talk loudly so that I can hear. And, my friend, wherever I go, whatever place I see… whoever sees me says:
‘This is the girl who has left house and hearth, and fallen in love with a foreigner.’”

Uddin’s last performance is a mourning song. He explains that in all of the previous songs, the words are more prominent than the tunes. In the mourning songs, he says, the opposite is true, and the tune may be wordless: “The village woman in East Bengal…when her daughter is dead, she cries loudly; she doesn’t care whatever language may come to her mind; she shouts; only she is expressing her feelings with some tune.” Uddin sings the mourning song, and follows it with another that uses the same tune, prefacing the latter with the introduction: “There is a little variation in this tune where the witch doctors are invoking the spirits from outside to punish them.”

The duration of the recording is fourteen minutes and two seconds. In this brief span, Jasim Uddin provides us with Bengali songs on the most important themes of human life: birth and death, childhood and parenthood, love and confl ict, nature and magic, the fertility of the earth and the ferocity of war. He organizes the songs to illustrate the life cycle as lived in a Bengali village, revealing himself to be a knowledgeable tradition-bearer, as well as a thoughtful professor and scholar. Though the recording technique is crude by today’s standards (e.g. the tape recorder is turned off after almost every song, which interrupts the continuity and causes the listener to miss parts of Uddin’s explanations), the sound quality on the recording is very clear, allowing Uddin’s musical and poetic mastery to shine.

Jasim Uddin—Folklorist and Poet

Jasim Uddin was born on January 1, 1903, in Tambulkhana, a village in the Faridpur district of East Bengal. As he related in his 1964 autobiography Jibon Katha, Uddin began reciting and writing poems at a very early age. “After writing three or four of my couplets in the notebook I was astonished. There were fourteen syllables in every line and the last syllable of every line rhymed with the second line’s last syllable….

Now that I had discovered how to fi nd a rhythm for my verse, who could hold me back?” By the time Uddin was a student at Faridpur Rajendra College, he had already won acclaim as a Bengali poet.

Uddin’s poetry was rooted in the rural Bengali village life he knew as a child; his language was the language of the farmers, the fi shermen, the boatmen, and the weavers of Bengali country villages. Though he never achieved the international renown of his fellow Bengali poet Rabindranath Tagore, Uddin’s work is well known throughout India and Bangladesh, and has been translated for school curricula in both countries.

It has also been translated into European languages, including English. Tagore himself admired Uddin, and wrote that “Jasim Uddin has opened a new school, a new language which is immortal.”

At the time of Uddin’s birth, eastern Bengal was part of British colonial India. During his childhood, it was severed from western Bengal and made a separate province (Eastern Bengal and Assam), which angered Bengali nationalists. Although the region rejoined the rest of Bengal in 1912, in 1947 it was again ceded to become East Pakistan.

In 1971, with help from neighboring India, this contested land became a sovereign nation, the People’s Republic of Bangladesh. All of these tumultuous events occurred during Uddin’s lifetime, and involved the religious division between Muslims and Hindus, as well as the lesser prestige and political power of Bengali language and culture relative to the majority cultures of India and Pakistan

As a Bengali nationalist in this critical period, Uddin was aff ected by the political and religious divisions of the era. However, he remained personally opposed to division within Bengali culture. Although he was a Muslim, he grew to love and respect the Hindu culture of his neighbors. In his memoirs, Uddin stressed his strongly held belief that Bengali culture, especially literature, belongs to both Hindus and Muslims. “Th ose who would separate the two [cultures] and write literature will not last many days, I am sure,” he wrote.

Uddin was himself aff ected by this issue. In the 1920s one of his poems was included in the matriculation exam at the University of Calcutta, which caused some controversy among the Hindu majority; his inclusion was defended by his mentor and friend, Professor Dinesh Chandra Sen. Uddin also treated the theme of religious division in his own writings, especially the long narrative poem “Gipsy Wharf ”, which depicts a romance between a Muslim boy and a Hindu girl. In attempting to depict both communities fairly, Uddin created a work that spoke to most Bengali people, and that has survived the test of time.

Uddin was also an important folklorist. From 1931 to 1937, as a Ramtanu Lahiri Scholar at the University of Calcutta, he collected several thousand rural Bengali folksongs under the guidance of Professor Sen. In 1938 he left Calcutta to teach at the University of Dhaka. In 1944 he joined the government of East Pakistan in the Department of Information and Broadcasting. He retired as the deputy director of that agency in 1962. During the course of Uddin’s career, he collected over ten thousand folksongs, making him one of the most successful folklore collectors of his time. In addition, he wrote important articles and books on the interpretation of Bengali folksongs, folktales and other genres. Th is scholarly activity gives the AFC recording even greater interest for international scholars in ethnographic disciplines such as folklore, ethnology, and ethnomusicology.

The Jasim Uddin Recording: An Archival History

Staff at the American Folklife Center did not become aware of the importance of the Jasim Uddin recording until September, 2008, when Dr. Jamal Anwar, Uddin’s son, contacted AFC to request a copy for the Folk Culture Museum at Jasim Uddin House in Faridpur, Bangladesh. AFC staff made the copy, thus repatriating this small sample of Bengali cultural heritage.

The original recording was made on July 24, 1957, by Sidney Robertson Cowell and her husband, composer Henry Cowell, who were conducting fi eld research in Asia. The recording came to the AFC Archive as part of the Sidney Robertson Cowell Duplication Project, and its history is recounted in a memo written on May 14, 1958, by Rae Korson, then the Head of the Library’s Archive of Folk Song, to Harold Spivacke, then Chief of the Library’s Music Division:

“Mrs. Cowell recorded twelve double-track tapes of various sizes and has now very generously off ered to permit the Library of Congress to duplicate them for the collections in the Archive of Folk Song.

The Cowells have expressly avoided depositing the recordings elsewhere in the hope that, by being in the Library of Congress, these important sound documents would be available to the greatest number of scholars. The countries represented in this widely varied collection are Iran, India, Pakistan, Burma, Th ailand, and Malaysia.”

During the 1950s, southern and southeastern Asia were represented in the Archive only by thirty-nine short commercial discs from India, a single reel of Pakistani music for the sitar, and two reels of songs and instrumental music made in the Library’s recording studio by a visiting Th ai musician. For that reason, Korson explained, “we feel that for this area in particular, we must take advantage of every opportunity which presents itself.” Fortunately, Spivacke agreed, and the duplication project went forward; as a result, the recording has not only been preserved at the Library, but repatriated to Bangladesh, where it can be heard in the museum at Faridpur.

Since the 1950s, AFC has greatly expanded its holdings of South Asian materials. The full list of AFC’s South Asia collections can be consulted in our online fi nding aid, South Asia Collections in the Archive of Folk Culture, at http://www.loc.gov/folklife/guides/ SouthAsian.html

Endnotes

1 Uddin, Jasim (Jasimuddin). 1939. The Field of the Embroidered Quilt: A Tale of Two Indian Villages (translated from Bengali to English by E.M. Milford). Calcutta: Oxford University Press, Indian Branch.

www.Jasimuddin.org

Songs of Jasim Uddin

Introduction

Song books of Jasim Uddin

I. Available video songs of Jasim Uddin

Bhatiali Songs by Poet Jasim Uddin

List of Songs from Rangila Nayer Majhi and Recording Company at Kolkata, India

3.Selected Songs of Jasim Uddin

Bondhu rangila re -- a tribute to S D Burman

FOLK SONGS OF BENGAL

Nakshi Kanthar Mathey: Kiran on a philosophical quest

You've set me adrift

2.1 Children Nursery, Poems and Kabigan

Children Nursery and Poems

Kabi Gaan

Music books of Jasim Uddin

3. Folk Songs Of East Bengal by Jasim Uddin

Folk-song is the collective creation of a whole people

A tradition which ridicules the clash of civilisations

Civilisations are built on the exchange and encounter of different cultural traditions

4. Popular Songs of Jasim uddin

"Come to Garden by Night"

Nishte Jaio Phul bane, O Bhomora

O Father Come Let Us Plough

"O Bajan Chal Jai Chal mathe Langol baite

You've set me adrift . . .

Dotara

5. CULTURAL AND FOLKLORE HERITAGE

Bangladesh snake charmers

A gripping saga Palli Kabi Jasim Uddin's "Beder Meye" staged