Remembering Thakur Jayadev Singh and Kunwar Narayan through music

The Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts (IGNCA) celebrated the 126th birth anniversary of late Thakur Jayadeva Singh, with the release of ‘Sangeet-Sahitya-Darshan’ a compilation of his valuable thoughts on music, literature and philosophy followed by a special lecture by Prof. Navjivan Rastogi, ‘Nadadhinam Jagat’ by Dr. Shanno Khurana and Dhrupad recital by Pt. Ritwik Sanyal.

Dr. Kapila Vatsyayan spoke about the profound knowledge of Thakur Jayadev Singh in a variety of subjects and acknowledged the help of Dr. Premlata Sharma in bringing out his personal collection of books.

Dr. Shanno Khurana spoke in great detail about how she came to be acquainted with Thakur and how she started learning music under his guidance when he sent her to train under the Gurus and Ustads of different Gharanas, encouraged her to sing for operas and do research on folk music of Rajasthan.She sang a couple of Thakur’s compositions in Bageshree, a Sanskrit composition in Jaijaiwanti “Sakhi mama vyatha kasmai nivedaye, Vasant aagata, sah naagata….” (Oh dear friend, with whom I share the agony of my heart, spring has come but not him…), Kabir Dohas in Jaija-Bilawal, a combination of Jaijaiwanti and Bilawal, the Darbari bandish “toot gaye been ke taar…” that he composed after cremating his wife.

The ‘Sansmaran-Gatha’ by Pt. Ritwik Sanyal reached the invocatory function to its contemplative climax. Fondly reminiscing his innumerable memories, interspersed with the Dhrupad recital, accompanied by Harishchandra Pati, he offered his own composition as the ultimate homage.

It was a Dhrupad in raga Multani set to Sool-Tala, “Shri Jayadeva Singh sur-shruti-raman / raga-darshan nit hridi anuswan…” where the first line of the composition underlined Thakur’s intense joy and persistence for total tunefulness and the word ‘Anuswan’ would relate to his love and commendable work on Shaiva-Darshan and the concept of ‘Anuranan’ indicated Thakur as an authority on Kashmir Shaivism.

The antara (second half of the composition) ‘Chintan manthan ‘Shruti-Jnan’ gahan mein Thakur ko naman’ on one hand spoke of his in depth knowledge and on the other it also had the pseudonym of the composer.

One came to know during a conversation with Sanyal later that Thakur had listened to Allahbande and Zakiruddin during early 20th century. The reputed duo happened to be the grandfathers of his Guru, who told him about Thakur’s deep understanding of swar-shruti and the purity of each swar. Thakur used to listen to Sanyal’s Guru Ud Zia Mohiuddin Dagar play the Rudra-veena and at the ripe age of 92 would wish to learn veena from him. Thakur loved the Dhrupad alaap that supports the autonomy of swar. No wonder Sanyal reversed the sequence of his Dhrupad recital that opened with the bandish, the invocatory Dhrupad composition going through layakari, the rhythmic play, jod-jhala, finally culminating into the meditative alaap, symbolising the journey from laukik to alaukik, from the concrete to the abstract!

The IIC auditorium was abuzz with eager lovers of literature and music for ‘Jeevan Raga’, an evening of musical rendition of Kunwar Narayan’s select poems, by Shubha Mudgal, during the three-day festival ‘Remembering Kunwar Narayan’, celebrating the 90th birth anniversary of the poet, writer and thinker. Each poem would be recited by Jitendra Ramprakash before Shubha would render it in ragas and styles chosen according to bhava, the emotional content of the particular poem.

The opening one ‘Ek sham’ for instance, was composed in the sombre swaras of raga Marwa and a very slow gait of Rupak that conveyed the ethos of not just the pensive poem but the poet too. The flight of the bird in the opening line “Kavita ek udaan hai, chidiya ke bahane…”, in the next poem ‘Kavita ke bahane’, was depicted with the flourish of a leisurely taan.

The rishabh - pancham sangati of raga Kamod was used most imaginatively in the exclamation of ‘He Ram…’ in the poem ‘Ayodhya-1992’. The sprightliness of the next one “Bahar aayi hai…” in typical dadra style with the lilting theka of dadra, matched the wild flowers attacking the city with their vibrancye. Each poem, enhanced by the sensitive touches of harmonium by Sudhir Nayak and tabla by Aneesh Pradhan, was a true tribute to the poet.