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    The Shehnai of Bismillah Khan

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    amitbiswas2815

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    The Shehnai of Bismillah Khan

    Uploaded by

    amitbiswas2815
    39 views9 pages

    Original Title

    The shehnai of bismillah khan (1)

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    39 views9 pages

    The Shehnai of Bismillah Khan

    Uploaded by

    amitbiswas2815

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online from Scribd
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    The shehnai of bismillah khan

    History of shehnaI
    Emperor Aurangzeb banned the playing
    of pungi in the palace. The reason was
    that it had a sharp and unpleasant sound.
    A barber thought to improve it. He chose
    a pipe with a natural hollow stem. He
    made seven holes on its body. He played
    on it closing and opening some of these
    holes. It produced a sweet sound. He
    played it before the royalty. It needed a
    name. So it was named after the player.
    He was a nai (barber). It was first played
    in the Shah chambers.
    Shehnai and Bismillah Khan

    The sound of the shehnai was considered


    auspicious. So it is played in temples and
    at weddings in north India. Earlier it was
    part of the traditional music groups.
    Ustad Bismillah Khan has brought it onto
    the clas-sical stage.
    Bismillah’s childhood

    As a five-year old Bismillah Khan played


    gilli-danda near a pond in Dumraon in
    Bihar. He would go to the nearby Bihariji
    temple. There he would sing the Bhojpuri
    chaita. At the end he would earn a big
    laddu weighing 1.25 kg. It was on behalf
    of the local Maha-raja. This happened 80
    years ago. This little boy later earned the
    Bharat Ratna. It is the highest civilian
    honour.
    Bismillah Khan’s birth and parents

    Bismillah Khan was bom on March


    21,1916 in a family of musicians in
    Bihar. His grand¬father Rasool Bux
    Khan was the shehnai- nawaz of the
    Bhojpur king’s court. His father
    Paigambar Bux and other ancestors were
    great shehnai players.
    Bismillah as a young singer

    The young boy Bismillah Khan took to


    music early in life. At three, his mother
    took him to his maternal uncle’s house in
    Benaras. He was attracted towards his
    uncle’s practise the shehnai. Soon he
    started going with his uncle Ali Bux to
    the Vishnu temple in Varanasi to play the
    shehnai. Soon he started practising the
    playing of the instrument. For years the
    temple of Balaji and Mangla Maiya and
    the banks of the Ganga became the places
    where he could practise. The flowing
    waters of the Ganga inspired him to
    invent new raagas.
    Bismillah’s rise
    At the age of 14 Bismillah accompanied
    his uncle to the Allahabad Music
    Conference. The opening of the All India
    Radio in Lucknow in 1938 became a big
    break for him. He became a shehnai
    player on radio.

    Bismillah as ‘the first Indian’


    Bismillah Khan became the first Indian to
    greet the nation with his shehnai on
    August 15, 1947. He played Raag Kafi
    Irom Red Fort to people like Mahatma
    Gandhi and Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru.
    Bismillah Khan goes abroad and his
    effect on film world
    Bismillah Khan has given many
    memorable performances both in India
    and abroad. His first trip abroad was to
    Afghanistan. King Zahir Shah was deeply
    impressed by his shehnai. He gave him
    priceless Persian car¬pets. Film director
    Vijay Bhatt was greatly impressed. He
    named his film Gunj Uthi Shehnai after
    the instrument. The film was a hit and his
    composition Dil ka khilona hai toot gaya
    became a record breaker.
    Film world not Bismillah’s like
    Bismillah Khan’s music in films didn’t go
    beyond Vijay Bhatt’s Gunj Uthi Shehnai
    and Vikram Srinivas’s Kannada film
    Sanadhi Apanna. He found the film world
    artificial and glamorous. He could not
    compromise with it.
    Bismillah Khan’s awards
    Awards came in plenty for him. He
    became the first Indian to perform at the
    Lincoln Centre Hall in the USA. He took
    part in the World Exposition in Montreal,
    in the Cannes Art Festival and in the
    Osaka Trade Fair. An auditorium in
    Teheran was named after him ‘Tahar
    Mosiquee Ustaad Bismillah Khan’.
    National awards like the Padmashri, the
    Padma Bhushan and the Padma
    Vibhushan were conferred on him.
    BY- AMIT KUMAR BISWAS
    CLASS- IX B

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