Art & Entertainment

Raag Shuddh Dharwadi

There's something about Dharwad. A whole pantheon of Hindustani greats has its roots here.

Advertisement

Raag Shuddh Dharwadi
info_icon

The jowar roti in the Dharwad region is called 'bakri'. And wherever you go in the region, the one thing you are sure to hear about is how much Pandit Bhimsen Joshi loves it. So much so that it begins to make his music appear secondary!

Gangubai Hangal, eight years older than the maestro and a legend herself, is a veritable storehouse of Bhimanna's bakri stories. She tells you how there was a little corner-shelf designated as 'Bhimannana Madu' in a Kundagol house, where one Gundappa would store bakri for Bhimsen, then a disciple of the great Sawai Gandharva. This was just in case the fare at the guru's place wasn't filling enough for the young man. She also tells you how when he made concert-halts at her place, he'd prefer the delicate bakri made by one Gowramma over what she served. "Bhimanna would personally go and pick up the bakri from Gowramma's house in Dharwad before we served lunch," she recollects.

Advertisement

Confirmation of Bhimsen's penchant for bakri comes also from his disciple Pt Madhava Gudi, who lived in his house for nearly three decades. "His wife Vatsalabai," he says, "although not a native of Dharwad, had learnt to make good bakris, which he always preferred with its traditional accompaniments: a dry curry of fenugreek leaves (menthya palya), brinjal curry, dry groundnut chutney, curds and tiny pieces of onion."

info_icon


Kumar Gandharva wasn't exactly from Dharwad but from Belgaun district bordering it

Hearing all this, you can't help but conjure up a theory: perhaps the secret behind Bhimsen Joshi's deeply resonant voice is the bakri dust filter it has passed through since his childhood!

But move beyond this trivia and you wonder what it is about the undivided Dharwad district, what special element in its air and soil, that produced not just a Bhimsen Joshi but a string of 20th-century legends of Hindustani classical music, be it Sawai Gandharva, Panchakshari Gawai, Mallikarjun Mansur, even Gangubai Hangal, Basavaraj Rajguru or, from the outer fringes of Belgaum district bordering Dharwad, even Kumar Gandharva. Don't look for an answer, locals tell you, it's like entering the complex maze of a raga which only a master can intuitively negotiate.

Advertisement

info_icon


Mallikarjun Mansur

Press on regardless, and sitarist Ustad Hameed Khan, grandson of sitar maestro Ustad Rahimat Khan, offers his family's move to Dharwad as something of an explanation. "My grandfather," he recounts, "who was at the court of the Bhavnagar king, once came to perform during the Mysore Dasara. On his way back, one of his admirers requested him to perform at Dharwad. So smitten was he by the place that he never went back. He just wrote a letter to his family, asking them to shift lock, stock and barrel." Why did he do so, you ask. "One main reason was the erudition of the listeners. The pleasant weather, the greenery and the serenity of the place perhaps came as a bonus. Dharwad is a workshop for musicians; the riyaz that happens here stands you in good stead all your life."

Ramakanth Joshi, Bhimsen's cousin and the publisher of his biography, says that besides his musical training, what shaped Bhimsen and other musical legends was also the intellectual climate of the region. They grew up in the presence of great writers and thinkers. Bhimsen, for instance, was close to poet laureate D.R. Bendre, and rendered his poems most soulfully. He also acted in plays written by Kerur Vasudevacharya and Bendre Laxman Rao. "Bhimsen was also an actor," says Ramakanth. "There were musicals (Bagyashri and Parivartana) written specially for him, and in one production of Nala-Damayanti, he not only played the role of Nala, but also sang the 40 songs in it for all the characters."

Gangubai has always felt there is something in Dharwad's soil that pushes one to seek perfection. "I still remember Bhimanna and me doing the early morning 'karaj mehnat' on an empty stomach in Kundgol to perfect the lower octave," she says. "At times, he used to also show the marks on his back and joke that his music did not come by riyaz alone. The marks were a reminder of the several pots of water he had to carry everyday from a pond, to fill up the vessels in our guru's house." Gangubai is deeply nostalgic about the intense training they received in Kundgol under Sawai Gandharva, and recalls how her Bhimanna would carry a lantern as he accompanied her to the local railway station every night when she headed back home to Hubli. She also recalls Bhimsen's 'gandabandhan', an event where the guru accepts you as his disciple in public. "It happened at the Hubli Railway Institute and our guru Sawai Gandharva tied threads of five colours on his wrist. This was around 1948-49. As an elder sister I feel very proud about my brother being called a Bharat Ratna (an award he received earlier this month)."

Advertisement

info_icon


Kalkeri Sangeet Vidyalaya that trains children from poor families

However, despite Dharwad's claim to fame, fame itself is what people seek outside it. "Though people do their musical penance in Dharwad, all their fame and money comes from outside," says Ustad Hameed Khan. Pt Madhava Gudi agrees. "The unstated rule," he says, "has been that you perfect your art in Dharwad, then cross over to Maharashtra to be recognised. That is what my guruji (Bhimsen) did too. While Gangubai and Mansur lived in Dharwad and went out frequently to perform, Joshiji shifted base to Pune." Justifying it somewhat, he adds, "In my guruji's younger days, each town in Maharashtra had music circles; there were nearly 100 in Mumbai alone. You could never imagine getting this kind of exposure in Dharwad."

The Dharwad region's reputation for Hindustani music is not all history and nostalgia, though. Even today, it's the only place in the country that has two gurukuls to impart training in Hindustani classical music. There is the Veereshwara Punyasharam of Pandit Puttaraja Gawai in Gadag, where nearly a 1,000 students are being taught classical music. Started by Panchakshari Gawai, it has an almost century-old tradition of training musicians. All of Dharwad's greats have some or the other association with this ashram. A more recent addition to the region's musical heritage is the Kalkeri Sangeet Vidyalaya, located on a hillock about 15 km from Dharwad town, for talented children from the lower economic strata. Besides, there are scores of other pandits teaching out of their homes, where students tune the tanpura at the break of dawn and do riyaz until dusk falls, keeping alive Dharwad's fabled musical tradition.

Advertisement

Tags

    Advertisement

    Advertisement

    Advertisement

    Advertisement

    Advertisement

    Advertisement