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3. Folk Songs Of East Bengal by Jasim Uddin
(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
 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
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 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
 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 both East 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...
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
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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
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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.
 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:
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.
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
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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.
 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.
 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.
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Come October 31 and it's time for music lovers to remember Kumar Sachin Dev Burman. It was on this day in 1975 that the great music composer left us.
Bengali or Bangla, language belonging to the Indic group of the Indo-Iranian subfamily of the Indo-European family of languages. Bengali is one of the most widely spoken languages of the world. Bengali is the main language spoken in Bangladesh. Bengali has more speakers-some 190 million-than all but a handful of other languages of the world. Like other Modern Indo-Aryan languages, Bengali has drastically reduced the complex inflectional system of Old Indo-Aryan.
Kabi Gaan was a popular musical from in the 19th century Bangla. Kabi songs were sung in public music competitions by two rival groups each led by a kabi (poet) or kabiwalah. 
Come to the garden by night.
Allah Megh de pani de …”
Abbasuddin stayed in Kolkata from 1931 to 1947. Initially, he worked temporarily as a clerk in the DPI office and then in the Department of Irrigation in a permanent post. Abbasuddin Ahmed died on 30 December 1959.He sang different types of songs such as folk songs, modern songs, patriotic songs, as well as Islamic songs. He also sang Urdu songs. But Abbasuddin became renowned mainly as a singer of folk songs.
In Kolkata Abbasuddin made a number of gramophone records with His Master's Voice as well as with Megaphone, Twin and Regal. By singing at various functions in villages, towns and cities as well as by recording his songs, Abbasuddin made music acceptable and popular in conservative Bengali Muslim society.
In the 1940s, Abbasuddin's songs played a significant role in raising the Muslim public opinion in favour of the pakistan movement (banglapedia).
His daughter, Ferdousi Rahman, his youngest son, Mustafa Zaman Abbasi, and his granddaughter, Nashid Kamal, are also renowned singers (Wakil Ahmed). 
Annanda, a Namosudro (untouchable -lowest cast Hindu), a musician and singer was Jasim Uddin's one of the best friends since 1923. He visted several times Annad's Village Bautipara, PO Choumukha, Faridpur. Jasim Uddin loved baromashi,bichet, kirton, rakhali, and many music related to Chaitra Puja, Ashin Puja
Bhatiali songs, popularly known as boatman’s songs are popular among the boatmen of Bangladesh and West Bengal. The songs are believed to have originated in low-lying areas of where boats once were the only means of transport. Ample references exist in the medieval musical literature of India to a raga known as Bhatiali or Bhatiari. Musicologists presume that the present day form of Bengali folk music derived from this classical raga.
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.
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."
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.
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.
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 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.