DHRUBA GHOSH is one of the most lyrical instrumentalists of India
Just the three playing strings and twenty sympathetic strings of the sarangi veritably sing in all their sonorous splendour in the hands of Dhruba Ghosh, a leading master of this powerful instrument.
The impassioned bowing and the sharp cutting edge of his rhythmic shifts build up a captivating tension, with delicate embroidery of fine lines or bold colours on fine silk, or the virtuosic series of flights across octaves, like formations of cranes surging against a vast blue sky.
The sarangi was popularly known as the ‘instrument of a hundred colours’. In the hands of Dhruba Ghosh it is much more. The traditional classical sarangi recital has dynamically bloomed with the reflections and innovations that he has put into the matrix of a concert, whilst he has remained centered in its essential characteristic nature.
…….that of the sufi’s soulful lute
At times he just spirals into a great flourish or a song, as it were, from within the fabric of a sarangi recital and keeps the listener spellbound in timelessness.
That is the mystique of Dhruba Ghosh’s musicianship. ***********
DHRUBA GHOSH is an inheritor of the tradition of his masters, his father the late Pandit Nikhil Ghosh, famed percussionist-thinker, the late Ustad Sagiruddin Khan, sarangi maestro of the legendary Ustad Bundu Khan style of Delhi, Pandit Dinkar Kaikini, veteran vocalist-composer and Ustad Ali Akbar Khan, the world-renowned sarod maestro. Dhruba Ghosh is the nephew of the legendary flautist the late Pandit Pannalal Ghosh.
**********
DHRUBA GHOSH’s solo performances have been acclaimed in different parts of India and also art music societies and international music festivals in Europe e.g. Bratislava International Music Festival, Helsinki International Music Festival, Flanders International Music Festival, Baroque Music Festival - Brussels, Silk Route Festival at Athens, Rudolstadt Music & Dance Festival, Germany. His collaboration concerts with Baroque music, European classical music, Contemporary Music, traditional music of Greece, Iran, Bulgaria, China, Japan, Korea and Uzbekistan are known for the intense focus on melody and lyricism. His concepts and performances in the domain of World Music in Germany, UK, Norway and Japan are a significant shift from the usual. --- Between 1974 and1985 Dhruba toured Europe, North America, Australia and the Far East with his father and brother Nayan, the trio known as a TRAYA, which became known as one of the early groups from India to give concerts and to give lecture-demonstrations at various Universities and Music conservatories.
********* DHRUBA GHOSH has been at the core of the formation of a World String Orchestra in Japan involving the traditional bowed instruments of Japan, China, Korea, Uzbekistan and India.
He has also accompanied some of the finest vocalists of north India and the Indian sub-continent.
********** DHRUBA GHOSH's principal role in the Sarangi Mela at Bhopal in 1989 where nearly a 100 sarangi players had assembled, is known very well in the world of Sarangi players and North Indian Music. Besides playing his innovations in Solo playing Dhruba also spelt out clear ways to revive public interest in this fading-away instrument as also to encourage players descending from players' families.
********* DHRUBA GHOSH is currently the Principal of the Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan's Sangeet and Nartan Shikshapeeth at Chowpatty, Mumbai. Previously he was the Guest Professor at the Rotterdam World Music Conservatory, Holland. ************* *********** **********
COLLABORATION PROJECTS ----
LORD OF THE RINGS symphony concert under the baton of Music Director Howard Shore, in Antwerp, Belgium 2004 and in the Acropolis, Athens, Greece under the baton of Markus Huber in 2005.
ROSS DALY Lyra virtuoso and the IRIS project, Greece, besides playing at the Olympics Opening ceremony at Heraklion, Greece 2004.
SARANGI & BAROQUE MUSIC: Sarangi and Viola-da-Gamba with Philippe Pierlot since 2000.
String collaboration on compositions of JOHN MEYER, London with cellist Justin Pearson 1995.************** ********* ***********
CONTEMPORARY MUSIC ------
ENSEMBLE MODERN: Contemporary Music Festival, House of World Culture, Berlin with the famed Ensemble of Frankfurt.
ENSEMBLE MUSIQUE NOUVELLES: Contemporary Music Festival in Grenoble, France and Festival of India, Brussels, Belgium with the well-known Ensemble of Mons, Belgium with his close colleague Cello virtuoso Jean-Paul Dessy. ********* *********** ***********
WORLD MUSIC------ WORLD STRING ENSEMBLE: Tokyo Project with Traditional Bowed instruments of Japan, China Okhinawa, Korea, Uzbekistan and India.
ASIAN FANTASY ORCHESTRA: Tokyo collaborating with renowned virtuosii like saxaphonist Kazutoki Umezu, Guitarist Watanabe, Drummer Senba, violinist Aska kaneko, pop singer EPO.
Concert with famed Jazz pianist of Japan Yamashita in 1996.
TRILOK GURTU: African Fantasy recording project
TASA, Toronto since 2000. ************ *********** ***********
TECHNO--------
ORGANIK: D. J. Robert Miles, Recording Project. London.
RAGATRONICS - Norway: Shri & Bugge Wesseltoft. ************ *********** **********
REVIEWS -----------
“At times the soulful harsh sound of his sarangi seemed to be hovering like an eagle above the mountains, falling and rising with the breath of the winds.”
……The Age, Melbourne, Australia
“The opening Komal Rishabh Asavari on sarangi by Dhruba Ghosh indicated the artiste’s rare class.”
…THE TELEGRAPH, KOLKATA, INDIA
“ I love and admire the way that you unify so intimately feeling and music. Your poems glorify the fundamental Advaita. Well the most convincing testimony is precisely your music. No duality here between the sounds you produce and the feelings you have, and vice-versa. Each note is so loaded.
I was moved by the love and tenderness expressed in the Raga Jhinjhoti, and this without ever falling into sentimentality. I was amazed by the continuous sarangi-playing, without taking a breath, at the end of the Raga Charukeshi: there you really left me breathless !
You really seem to be a innovator of the sarangi, because your style is immediately recognizable and, for instance, I never heard other sarangi players accompanying their singing the way you do. “
….ANDRE FONTEYNE commenting on ”Songs of the Three Mystics”, CD.
“Dhruba Ghosh then awoke his public out of this intensive dream with the Raga Lalit whose exciting intervals symbolize the transition between night and day.”
…..FRANKFURTER ALLGEMEINE ZEITUNG, GERMANY
“Beginning in raga Puriya Kalyan, Pt. Ghosh invested the phrases with pathos and then with longing, devotion and meditation, through mild and sharp strokes culminating in a fiery moment of surrender.
The piece in Manjh Khamaj was a romantic interlude and his impromptu breaking into a song was much appreciated. To complete the circle, the Sarangi pulled at the heartstrings announcing dawn.”
……….THE HINDU, CHENNAI, INDIA
.
************ ********** ***********
ABOUT THE SARANGI
The Sarangi is the premier bowed instrument in North India or Hindustani concert Music. It is performed solo as well as in accompaniment to Hindustani vocal music. It has a concert music history of more than a hundred and fifty year although it has been in the folk genre in varying shapes, timbres and names for centuries. There are distinct schools or styles of playing and techniques developed by their great exponents.
The Sarangi is held vertically and placed on the lap. The three main strings are of gut and are played with the cuticles of the middle three fingers of the left hand. Thirty-five sympathetic strings of steel pass beneath the main strings. The main strings rest on an ivory bridge while the sympathetic strings pass through it. This bridge is placed on a leather strip, which rests on the parchment membrane covering the hollow belly. The melody bowed on the main strings along with the resonance from the sympathetic strings gives the deep and sonorous voice to the Sarangi. ********* ********* *********
INNOVATIONS----- DHRUBA GHOSH made several innovations with the Sarangi instrument itself. Among other things he has innovated a FOUR-string sarangi introducing the fourth higher string and another sarangi with FIVE strings and these have smoothly enlarged the range of notes. This was achieved with the expertise of the noted Belgian Luthier and composer Paul Colinet. There are references in history to sarangi having fourth but lower string. Dhruba has also reduced the number of sympathetic strings to twenty. For over thirty years he has introduced and played with the cello string for the lowest string. This has enabled a more sustained sound in the low register.
These apart, in the playing of solo music Dhruba Ghosh has richly innovated on the adaptation of the full free time exposition known as alaap, jod, jhala to the sarangi as well as introduced several techniques to fully exploit the potential of this versatile instrument.
He is perhaps the only composer for exclusive sarangi repertoire.
********** ************ ***********
DISCOGRAPHY-------- DISCOGRAPHY ----------- DISCOGRAPHY
" Soulful Sarangi"
Shree Raga, Tilak Kamod, Bihag, Bahar
MAGNASOUND, India 1989
Yaman, Hemant
INDIA ARCHIVE MUSIC, USA 1991
Kaushi Kanada, Kajri
INDIA ARCHIVE MUSIC, USA 1991
Jaijaivanti, Mishra Khamaj Thumri
WATER LILY ACOUSTICS, USA1991
Multani, Puriya, Kedara, Piloo thumri, Baul Song
WATER LILY ACOUSTICS, USA1991
Komal Rishabh Asavari,
Dhun - Basant Mukhari
INDIA ARCHIVE MUSIC, USA 1993
" Bowing sounds from dawn to moonlight "
Ramkali, Shuddha Sarang, Marva, Hamir, Kafi Thumri
FONTI MUSICALI, Belgium1994
Kedara
RADIO VRT, BELGIUM 1999
Charukeshi
FESTIVAL VAN VLAANDEREN 2000
“Dakshini”
Sajana Tuma Aao in Charukeshi
Tarasa in Kirwani
FONTI MUSICALI, Belgium, December 2001
“Basant Mukhari at 5am in Paris”
VIRGIN RECORDS (India) Pvt. Ltd. 2002
“Songs of the Three Mystics ”
Hundred Colours, India, 2005
________________________________________
www.dhrubaghosh.com
________________________________________
************ ********** **********
CONTACT------- CONTACT -------- CONTACT:
BELGIUM, Brussels:
tele/fax : 0032-2-375 8858, Mobile: +32-477-585162 e-mail: dhrubaghosh@euphonynet.be
INDIA, Mumbai :
tele/fax : 0091-22-26705720, Mobile: + 91- 98201-33428 e-mail: sarangi1@vsnl.com
TENSUI uploaded new video work "Bringer of Jollity" on YouTube site. It is a collaboration work with "EXPERIENCE" of the MySpace friend. Please appreciate it by all means. Wish of comment to the YouTube site.
2009.July.21. 19:00 - Younger Than Yesterday-Yokosuka-Kanagawa / MySpace Cafe- 大滝町2-17エルスビル4F phone-0468288306 横須賀市, 神奈川県 238-0008JP 料金:￥2000. without drinks {バルドトドル} チベット仏教に伝わる輪廻転生経典をシタール音楽と映像でドラマ化、 ～魂の再誕生の旅をシミュレートします。 {BARDOTHODOL} Dramatize the transmigration sacred book handed down to Tibetan Buddhism、 ～with Sitar-music and image-picture～ Simulate the trip of the re-birth of the soul.
2009.July.22. 19:00 - alphabet soup-Shibuya-Tokyo / MySpace Cafe- 宇田川町37-12 カザマビル1F phone-0334686898 渋谷区, 東京都 150-0042 JP 料金:￥3000. with 1food+2drinks {バルドトドル} チベット仏教に伝わる輪廻転生経典をシタール音楽と映像でドラマ化, ～魂の再誕生の旅をシミュレートします。 {BARDOTHODOL} Dramatize the transmigration sacred book handed down to Tibetan Buddhism with Sitar-music and image-picture～ Simulate the trip of the re-birth of the soul.
thanks for the friendship. I stumbled across your Soulful Sarangi recording some time back and i just love it. Really great music, i hope i can find some more of it :)
