HEBBAL: A city troupe performed songs and dances based on the works of Rabindranath Tagore and Kazi Nazrul at the Veterinary College in Hebbal on Sunday.
The programme was organised by Manisha Sen, who founded a music group called Malanch in North Bengaluru 32 years ago. Sen is a musician herself and came to the city in the mid-eighties to teach Rabindra Sangeet and Nazrul Geeti.
The performance featured popular numbers like Durgam gir kantar moru and Ekla chalo re, which were written to rouse Indians during the freedom struggle.
Children danced to the popular tunes of Phule phule dhole dhole by Tagore and Chomke chomke dhir bhiru pay by Nazrul.
About the poets
Kazi Nazrul Islam was born in a poor family in 1899. He was a poet, lyricist, music composer as well as director. He wrote on patriotism, religion, love and loss. His Shyama Sangeet, songs on Goddess Kali are still sung by all music lovers. His life was a struggle against poverty, the British rule and great personal loss.
He lost his first two sons at an early age and began to suffer from Picks disease at the age of 43. Nazrul passed away in 1976.
Rabindranath Tagore was born in 1861 in a prosperous family and was a poet, philosopher, artist, writer, composer and playwright. He loved nature and his Nobel Prize winning Geetanjali had poems on nature, love, devotion, patriotism and other genres. Almost all of them were set to tune by the poet and are based in Hindustani music.
He too had to face great personal loss. His sister-in-law Kadambari Devi was his first friend who encouraged him to write. She committed suicide when he was 23. She was just two years older than him. He lost his son in 1907 and daughter in 1903. His wife passed away in 1902. Another daughter was rumoured to have a troubled marriage.
The poet rose above his personal struggles to become one of the best poets of Bengal and his music and poet remains unparalleled. He died in 1941.