On Saturday, December 8, the Anad Foundation presented Bhai Baldeep Singh in concert at the Koumantzelis Auditorium at Bentley University in Waltham. This was the culminating event in a series of concerts, lectures and recitals on the East Coast during November and December this year. Bhai Baldeep Singh is a thirteenth generation exponent of Gurbani Kirtan, a maestro of Dhrupad and pakhawaj as well as teacher, poet and luthier. The concert featured the Dhrupad Gurbani tradition and included music from the Sufi, Sikh and Bhakti traditions.

Bhai Baldeep Singh is true renaissance artist who has not only mastered his music, but has delved into past history to resurrect and preserve the origins of the musical pieces. His passion for preservation drove him to seek out one of the last remaining lute makers and learn the art of creating fine instruments that were used during the time of the Gurus. He has founded the Anad Foundation that is committed to the preservation and dissemination of the traditional knowledge and culture of South Asia and the Anad Conservatory, an institute of arts, aesthetics, cultural traditions and developmental studies at Sultanpur Lodhi in Punjab, India. The conservatory is located in an ancient 12^th century fort and includes a 14^th century mosque visited by Guru Nanak, and a durbar hall where the Maharaja of Kapurthala received his guests. The Foundation has compiled an international board of architectural and historical experts to help preserve and recreate the Fort and its environs to faithfully replicate the surroundings as they existed previously. When this architectural and artistic heritage is finally restored the students will have the unique experience of learning traditional music in an environment as close to when the original music was played. The beautiful images on the slides highlight the ageless beauty of the place and the current work ongoing in the conservatory including classes for local youth, workshops for international students, concerts from diverse world music traditions, poetry festivals, and demonstrations in traditional arts such as spinning, weaving and dance.

Saturday’s musical program began with a pakhawaj solo by Parminder Singh Bhamra, a senior student of Bhai Baldeep Singh. He skillfully executed intricate patterns in tala pancham sawari, a fifteen beat rhythmic cycle, with Rattan Bhamra providing the lehra cycle on strings. Parminder’s dynamic recitation of bols, the poetry of percussion, added another dimension to the powerful display of skill and rhythmic sound as he rendered traditional and new compositions that showed the vast array of the repertoire taught to him by his teacher, Bhai Baldeep Singh.

Bhai Baldeep was then joined by the accompanists and the sounds of raga kalyan alapa began to emerge. Raga kalyan is an evening melody with a fourth sharp, which corresponds to the western Phrygian mode. A former student of flying, Bhai Baldeep’s aeronautic abilities were demonstrated in beautiful patterns of flight through the skyscape of raga kalyan, ascending, descending, banking, diving in a weightless aerial dance. In about 38 minutes of improvisation (alap), rag kalyan was fully explored in all its potentials and melodic combinations, according to a variety of styles that range from the Dagar-Vani, the Khandar-Vani, the Nauhar-Vani and the authentic Gurbani tradition as transmitted in the lineage of Baba Jwala Singh. In rendering his alapa, Bhai Baldeep Singh was as if spinning the ragic (melodic) thread and then simultaneously weaving an intricate phulkari (a traditional Punjabi craft, in which embroidery is done in a simple and sparse design over a bridal shawl) —patterns of seeking, of attaining and of celebration, of japa - of dhyana— all embroidered albeit on the fabric of silence. One could actually witness and savour meticulous exploration and unfolding of the raga in all the three octaves, an exquisite display of the grammar and vigour of the raga, as well as the poetic mood of kalyan. The semantic of the rag was perfectly expressed in heterogeneity of embellishments, dynamics, and tempo that enchanted the listeners’ mind in lieu of words.

A dhrupad composition from the guru times, "gun naad dhuni anand ved", followed the alapa with more patterns and variations decorating the lines of mystical poetry celebrating the virtues of sound itself. This is an authentic masterpiece by the fifth Sikh master, Guru Arjan Dev set in chartaal, a twelve beat rhythmic cycle used in the medieval repertoire. Such a rare and precious rendition of the shabad is what Unesco would define as an intangible heritage of an ancient tradition.

More compositions followed and included treasures from the tradition as well as some of Bhai Baldeep’s own lively compositions in ten beats (jhaptaal and sulphakta) and seventeen beat (shikhar-taal) tals. Raga Bageshwari, with its romantic flair brought the audience to experience a different taste of Gurbani. The alap introduced an ancient musical composition from the Golden Temple tradition, “kaunko  kalanka raheo” by Bhagat Namdev, set in chartaal, where the author questions “who can remain impure chanting the Name?”  Bhagat Namdev’s questions found an ideal answer in the shabad “Hamari Piyari Amritdhari’, that Bhai Baldeep Singh musically set in shikhar-taal, recreating the profound and powerful dimension of the hymn.

The program ended with audience requests for more, which Bhai Baldeep kindly accommodated with a sweet hymn in raga bhairavi, a famous Khandar Vani composition, “jagat janani”, in a crisp (drut) geet-taal (seven beats) pattern. It seemed the beginning of a new concert, refreshing like a morning melody and a sweet sunray, when the shabad in tala dadra, "yaarve nit sukh sukhendi sa mai payyee", started at a slow peaceful pace. The end of the sonic journey was actually celebrated with "sant jana mil harjas gayeo", set in an original composition in ten beats by Bhai Baldeep Singh, in which he shows his incredible talent as a contemporary composer of the ancient tradition.

Bhai Baldeep’s singing was accompanied by Parminder Singh Bhamra on pakhawaj and Rattan Singh Bhamra on israj. Bhai Baldeep’s students, Dr. Francesca Cassio, Nirvair Kaur Khalsa, and Siri Sevak Kaur Khalsa accompanied with tanpura and vocals.

The event lasted for about three hours and a half, indeed a very unusual schedule for the Western audience. Yet surprisingly listeners remained in the enchanted sonic dimension of Gurbani, even after the stage lights went out and the lights in the auditorium were turned on. After the concert the guests chatted with the musicians over samosas and chai, warming the winter night with good company and praises for a memorable evening.

For more information on the Anad Foudnation and Bhai Baldeep Singh’s work: http://anadfoundation.org/

To help the foundation with its work; Anad USA, 790 E. 37th Avenue, Eugene, Oregon  97405

Contributors to this article are:

Dr. Francesca Cassio, Associate Professor Music Dept., Sardarni Harbans Kaur Chair in Sikh Musicology, Hofstra University, Hempstead - New York

Nirvair Kaur Khalsa, Founder and Director of Khalsa Montessori School in Tuscon, AZ

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