Folk music festival in Dhaka
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A weeklong folk music festival with the songs of seven eminent bauls, singers and composers began at the Bangladesh Shilpakala Academy Monday afternoon. State minister for cultural affairs, Promod Mankin inaugurated the festival at a function addressed, among others, by Shilpakala Academy’s director general Kamal Lohani, dance and music department director Mahmud Salim and young researcher Sumon Das.
Speaking on the occasion, Promod Mankin said, ‘The government is thinking of setting up branches of Shilpakala in every district of the country to spread music among the people.’
Reminding that the country once had more than 100 types of folk songs, the number of which has gradually declined, Kamal Lohani said, ‘We want to raise awareness of our folk songs among the new generation to prevent the invasion of foreign culture.’
‘With concrete roads everywhere, bullock carts are disappearing and similarly rivers are drying up leading to almost extinction of Bhawaiya and Bhatiali songs sung by the cart drivers and the boatmen’, Kamal Lohani added.
The festival would also include programmes of popular folk songs and discussion on legendry folk music composers Lalan Shah, Hason Raja, Radha Raman, Bijay Sarkar, Jalal Khan and Romesh Shil.
The inaugural programme began with a discussion on different aspects of the legendary composer Shah Abdul Karim. Reading out an essay on Shah Abdul Karim, Sumon Das said, ‘Abdul Karim had tirelessly composed songs to awaken the society and civilisation.’
‘Shah Abdul Karim had a progressive frame of mind and in his lifetime had written more than 150 patriotic songs,’ Sumon added. Following the discussion, Abdur Rahman, Bashir Ahmed Laili Pervin, Sutapa Roy, among others, rendered folk music in the programme.
Bashir Ahmed sang ‘Ranger dunia’, Mon pagla tui’, ‘Gramer nawjwan’, and ‘Saral tumi na’ and Abdur Rahman sang ‘Ki jadu Koria bonde maya lagayache’, ‘Gari chole na’, ‘Manush jodi hoite chau’. Laili Yasmin rendered ‘Ami Kulhara kalankini’ and ‘Bhobe ke koy je preti bhala na’ while Sutapa Roy sang ‘Hat bandhibe pa bandhibe mon bandhibe kemone’ and Ki dekhilam joler ghate’.
Today’s programme include discussion on Radha Raman by professor Nandalal Sharma. Saymon Zakaria will discuss on different aspects of Bijay Sarkar on January 27 and Bangla Academy director general Shamsuzzaman Khan will discuss on Hason Raja on January 28.
On January 29, Jalal Khan’s nephew Golam Faruque Khan will read out the essay on the composer written by Jatin Sarkar. Researcher Syed Mohammad Shayed will speak on Romesh Shil on January 30 while researcher Abul Ahsan Chowdhury will discuss on Lalan Shah on January 31. The programme will begin at 5:00pm everyday with the discussion on a particular composer and followed by songs by popular singers of the country.
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