THE CLASSICAL COLUMN

Pandit Vijay Kichlu

Ustad Abdul Karim Khan

Two of our greatest vocalists of the 20^th century were Ustad Abdul Karim Khan and Ustad Faiyaz Khan. When the news of Ustad Abdul Karim Khan’s death was conveyed to Ustad Faiyaz Khan at Baroda, he wailed, “Hai Allah, aaj se sur Hindustan se mar gaya” ( Oh God! from today the sur [tunefulness] has disappeared from Hindusthan).

True, another musician as melodious and tuneful as Ustad Abdul Karim Khan is yet to be born. Everybody, whether musician or music lover, who heard him, was mesmerized by his voice and believed that he had attained siddhi.

I was not fortunate enough to have heard him, but whoever did so has told me that in a performance nobody could make out when the Ustad had started singing. For sometime, even though he could be seen with an open mouth, only the sound of a tanpura could be heard. His voice was exactly the same as the sound of the tanpura.

Ustad’s influence was not confined to human beings only, but extended to animals as well. Two of his disciples, Kapileshwari Bua and Basant Kumar, have written in their books that Ustad Abdul Karim Khan possessed a dog whom he had named Tipu Mia, a pure vegetarian surviving solely on milk and vegetables. Believe it or not, he used to sing. They have mentioned that once at Satara in Maharashtra, Ustad Abdul Karim Khan arranged Tipu Mia’s advertised public performance - a packed hall listened to Tipu Mia sing a full scale in tune. They have further mentioned that the performance was repeated in Pune and Bombay.

Abdul Karim Khan was born in 1872 in Kirana, a village near Muzzafarnagar in western Uttar Pradesh. His father Kale Khan was not a great musician and as such he was trained by one of his uncles, Nanne Khan. He gave his first performance at the age of 11 years at Meerut, before many Ustads of the Kirana gharana, and impressed them immensely. His brother-in-law Hyder Buksh was also present, and was greatly touched by Abdul Karim’s genius. He was at that time the state musician of the Maharaja of Mysore, a great patron of music, who had musicians of both the Carnatic and Hindustani systems at his court. At the recommendation of Hyder Buksh, Abdul Karim Khan was invited by the Maharaja of Mysore, when he was about 18 years old, to sing at his court. His performance was sensational, and he stayed on in Mysore for some time.

During this period he got the opportunity of listening to many Carnatic vocalists and was greatly impressed by their technique of sargam. Consciously or unconsciously, this influenced his own gayaki. He became the first musician of the Hindustani system to introduce the use of sargam as an important ingredient of the gayaki. He was also the first musician to use the raga alap of dhrupad origin in the bilambit portion, and this brought a different dimension to the khayal gayaki. Ustad Rehmat Khan, the son of the legendary Ustad Haddu Khan of Gwalior, also left a deep impression on Abdul Karim Khan.

Ustad Abdul Karim Khan and his younger brother Abdul Haq went to Baroda for some time. Maharaja Siyaji Rao Gaikwad of Baroda heard him by chance, and engaged him and his brother Abdul Haq as court musicians. Life suddenly became very comfortable and interesting. His fame spread far and wide. He became close to the Gaikwad family, attracting Rajmata’s admiration and Maharaja Siyaji Rao’s generosity and care. He also started teaching the jaltarang to Prince Fateh Singh Gaikwad.

Ustad Abdul Karim Khan had an interesting but multifaceted personality. He was an impressive young man - a versatile musician who could play several instruments with authority, an able hunter and one who also possessed a highly spiritual bent of mind. He was a great devotee of Shreedi Sai Baba and Baba Tajuddin of Nagpur and used to spend long periods with them. He immensely enjoyed the company of saints and sanyasis. He was also extremely secular in his approach. Later in life, when he established two institutions, he named them Arya Sangeet Vidyalaya (Pune) and Saraswati Vidyalaya (Bombay). Most of the students in these institutions were Hindus and Brahmins.

There was another side to his personality, which again changed his life. He fell in love with the daughter of the Rajmata’s brother, Tara Bai, and early one fine morning eloped with her. It needed more than ordinary courage to run away with a daughter of the Gaikwad family. Fearing the wrath and the might of the Baroda raj, he took shelter, as advised, with another state; and consequently he became the court musician of Miraj in Maharashtra. He never visited Baroda again, even when Maharaja Siyaji Rao, many years later, met him at Mysore and expressed sympathy with him. Earlier he had refused the invitation of Pt. Vishnu Narayan Bhatkhande to attend the first Music Conference at Baroda in 1920.

From Tara Bai, Ustad Abdul Karim Khan had five children – Abdul Rehman, Champutai, Gulab, Abdul Hamid and Chhotutai. Later Tara Bai left Ustad Karim Khan and went to Kirana with all her five children. The eldest son, Abdul Rehman became Suresh Babu Mane, the eldest daughter, Champutai, took the name of Hirabai Barodekar; and the youngest, Chhotutai, became Saraswati Rane. Hirabai Barodekar had not taken enough training from her father when she left his home, and was later trained by Ustad Abdul Wahid Khan. She became one of the leading female classical vocalists of our country.

Broadly speaking we can say that the Kirana gharana has two branches, one led by Ustad Abdul Karim Khan and the other by Ustad Abdul Wahid Khan. Both gayakis had the same foundation but Abdul Karim Khan’s gayaki bore the influence of Carnatic music. Musicians like Ustad Rehmat Khan, Sawai Gandharva and Roshanara Begum were the leading products of Ustad Abdul Karim Khan’s training. Sawai Gandharva in turn trained Gangubai Hangal, Feroz Dustoor and Bhimsen Joshi, who became the leading performers of the Kirana gharana. Ustad Abdul Wahid Khan, apart from training Hirabai Barodekar, must have greatly influenced Ustad Amir Khan, also who adopted his style of singing.

When Ustad Abdul Karim Khan was 66 years old he was invited to a performance by Madras Gyan Samaj. During the journey he suddenly felt unwell. His inner voice told him that his time had come. At the next station, Singaperu-mal-koil, he got down, asked his man to spread a sheet on the platform, tuned his tanpura, started singing Darbari Kanhara, and within minutes was gone.

VIJAY KICHLU is a veteran Hindustani classical vocalist, who has done invaluable work for the promotion of training, education, scholarship and research in Hindustani classical music. He was instrumental in setting up the Sangeet Research Academy, Kolkata. His monthly column on Hindustani classical music is exclusive to the Mag.e.zine.