Suman Bhattacharya, arguably the most sought-after Bangla kirtan exponent of his generation, is usually seen performing for niche audiences across India. The Calcutta Performing Arts Foundation invited him to showcase his enchanting but extremely demanding art focused on a particular theme at Chowdhury House before urbane listeners who are alien to original full-length kirtan as opposed to its abridged three-minute versions made popular by numerous feature films or commercial records.
Bhattacharyais quite adept at handling both his rural and city-bred listeners and knows that very few can relate to this traditional art and its intrinsic aesthetic philosophy, which has its roots in the universal, analytical aspects of human psychology. The latter had been a favourite subject of the seers since time immemorial. Almost every Indian art and craft aims at inculcating divinity and thus transforming its practitioner and connoisseurs alike by unravelling the deepest and mysterious emotions of human psyche by following a maarga very lovingly and dedicatedly.
The root
The temple-centric ancient classical arts were meant to educate and entertain – all at once. Music is created out of vibrations and that is how it connects the microcosmic world with the macrocosmic universe so easily. The ancient forms of art, essentially based on Shaivite (male dominated), Vaishnavite (feminine sentiment-based) and Buddhist (renunciation oriented) philosophies, unfold the wisdom related to the principles which manifested the entire cosmos along with music, dance and allegorical abhinaya rooted on ‘anukaran’ (imitation) and ‘anukirtan’ (adulation-based narration, enumeration). Also termed as sankirtan or kirtan, these Sanskrit words led to one objective – singing praises of the lord during a presentation in the sanctum sanctorum of a temple.
Gradually, with the onslaught of alien culture in the North-Western regions of India, the venue of the cultural activities shifted to the royal courts. The commoners were deprived of the classy congregations where ‘kathakar’ or ‘kirtankar’ focused on the adulations of the rulers and ‘kirtan’ changed its character. But things were different in Bengal.
According to Bhattacharya, the common people in Bengal remained in touch with the temples essentially because of their musically active ‘naat-mandir’ or auditoriums. Many commoners were well-trained prabandh and dhrupad exponents, thanks to the hordes of pundits who migrated from Northern India for safer haven of music in Bengal and taught the locals liberally. To ward off the alien influences, mass singing like ‘naam-sankirtan’ or chanting the Lord’s name repeatedly, led by a devotee-singer, gathered momentum. Krishna, the one who attracts, became the central theme of these sankirtans ever since Chaitanya Mahaprabhu (1486-1533) recreated a mantra by giving primacy to Lord Krishna.
The masses led by Sri Chaitanya would go in trance while chanting this Mantra and it resulted in a powerful Bhakti Movement in Bengal and its adjacent states which later took entire India in its fold.
To emulate and adulate different stages of Lord Krishna’s life, it is believed that Sri Chaitanya also wrote several songs. But his contemporaries like Vidyapati, Chandidas and Jayadeva are hailed as the earliest littérateurs who were prolific composers of Radha-Krishna based padas (verses) in Maithili, Bangla and Sanskrit respectively. They immensely influenced the nascent Bengali literature. Later, many poet-composers arranged several verses as ‘padavali, following the example of Jayadeva’s Ashtapadi (eight verses in a sequence).
The presentation of such verses belonging to Vaishnav literature bifurcated from the usual ‘naam-sankirtan’ or mass chanting which is also termed as kirtan. Whereas, sung by a learned soloist, these strings of Vaishnava poems became famous as Pala kirtan in Bengal (colloquial term for ‘Padavali-Kirtan’). These were set to traditional classical ragas, talas and forms like prabandh, dhrupad, dhamar as well as folk songs like baul, bhatiyali etc. along with kirtan’s own character and typical nuances. The latter was liberally incorporated in Shyama Sangeet - which sing praises of Goddess Kali whose Shaakta devotees follow an entirely different path from that of Vaishnavs!
The winds of change threw up early modern kirtan singers like Kamala Jharia, Angurbala Devi, Chhabi Bandopadhyay and several others who presented typically nuanced, drastically abridged versions of Bangla Kirtan. This kept the word, genre and the art alive in the memory of city-dwellers who settle down during a full-fledged Pala (colloquial term for ‘Padavali-Kirtan’) once in a while – especially in a shraddh-ceremony when kirtan is customary.
Modern touch
Gradually, erudite kirtaniyas included the modern ‘Pancha-kavi’ led by Tagore, Nazrul, Atul Prasad, Rajanikanta and Dwijendralal. Suman Bhattacharya went a step ahead. He included the life history of the greats like Swami Vivekananda, Tagore and several others in his melodic narratives at times in Hindi or English to woo young students and senior citizens to the world of traditional kirtan. One can witness this especially during his television shows!
For the Chowdhury House concert, his theme was 'Maan Bhanjan' wherein Krishna tries to appease Radha after he failed to reach their rendezvous as promised. Impeccably dressed up in 'dhuti-kurta-uttariya' ensemble, Bhattacharya addressed all in Bangla. After the melodious invocation, he informed his listeners that each pala begins with a specific Gaur-chandrika which means - 'to be able to find a specific course of a recital devoted to a particular topic in the moonlit path shown by the specifically stylized adulations of Gaur (Chaitanya Mahaprabhu).'
According to Bhattacharya, the devotion-dipped rich verses describe naam (names), roop (features), gun (virtues) and leela (life-story) of the lord which are the four different ‘traps’ to hook devotees. Numerous similes like man-harin (deer like darting heart), nayan-khanjan (bird like itinerant eyes) inject lucidity in the narrative while sixty-four rasas, springing out of four different classifications each of ‘milan’ and ‘viraha’ experienced by nayikas belonging to eight categories, further help develop the theme.
To demonstrate some of these, the erudite kirtankar selected a variety of raga, tala, genres and verses in Bangla, Maithili, Brijbhasha, etc. Sanskrit verses were explained with the help of some superbly rendered Tagorean oeuvres. He excelled himself while describing the pathos ridden mood in a dhrupad set to raga Darbari replete with its characteristic oscillating Gandhar and Dhaivat. The multi-lingual literary treasures and delightful melodious rendition of both classical and folk genres with amazing virtuosity was laced by his expert philosophical comments, at times in impeccable English!
“ ‘Yasmin deshe yadaachaarah’ is clearly indicated by our scriptures,’ he explained earnestly, “and it is quite normal to act according to sthaan (place), kaala (occasion), paatra (recipients). Our sole aim is to reach and teach the masses. So, when in Rome, do as the Roman do! Besides, I knew that without the crutches of English I will not be able to get an entry to the so-called elite circles. So I did my Masters in English from Scottish Church College before doing M Mus from Rabindra Bharati University.
“I grew up in this metro but our home retained the original rural charm. My kirtankar father was not trained in classical music but would sing Ramayan, Baul, kavi-gaan, etc.; my mother would effortlessly sing something as complex as ‘Aakshep-Anuraag-Leela’ (eight varieties of complaint-based act of love) while cooking meals for us. I am blessed with elephant’s memory. Seeing this, my father baited me to sing ‘Nimai-Sannyas Pala’ for one roshogolla in 1978. I was four-years old then. My first cassette ‘Yavan Haridas’ was published when I was seven. I continued performing as the main singer of whole-night Pala-Kirtan sessions even while writing my exams in the mornings. It was challenging but I sailed through all this in flying colours because by then kirtan had become sweeter than any sweetmeat.”
Demanding genre
This is a demanding genre that encapsulates multifarious melodic forms, complex rhythmic cyclesimpeccable oratory with communicative facial expressions and graceful body movements. What inspired him to master all this?
“In my school’s Bangla text book, I chanced upon a pada that I had learnt from my first guru, Nilmani Das (Manoharshahi stream). Dismayed, I asked my teacher, how come we have a song? His answer was, ‘Children need to get introduced to such verses steeped in high philosophy.’ This inspired me to dig in deeper and deeper and led me to several learned gurus of Vaishnav Sahitya, mostly in Sanskrit. I studied Sanskrit and won the title of ‘Vyakaran-Ratna.’ Eminent maestros of dhrupad, khayal, kirtan and shrikhol groomed me. The toughest part of this journey was to acquire rarest of kirtan and folk compositions from the collectors of these gems.”
Bhattacharya has dedicated his life to revive this dwindling art. Apart from his venerated status as a faculty member of Vishwa Bharati (Shantiniketan), he is known for organising a mammoth kirtan congregation every year on the auspicious day of Mahalaya . “All this is to exchange ideas with fellow performers and to learn more to be able to perform and teach with confidence. With Prabhu-Kripa, my entire family supports me in all my endeavours,” summed up the devotee of kirtan humbly who, despite his plain looks, glows on stage as a kirtankar and captivates audience where he goes.
