A new book brings back-to-life forgotten singer Gauhar Jaan
A new book brings back-to-life forgotten singer Gauhar Jaan
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That is because each time the author came across information about Gauhar Jaan, first in Mysore and then again in Kolkata, heavy winds blew, thunder and lightening struck.
It was as if Sampath was getting a heavenly nudge to go ahead with this book. But writing about the celebrated nineteenth century singer turned out to be quite an experience.
Bangalore-based Sampath, a team leader with Hewlett Packard, came across Gauhar Jaan's name while researching for his first book Splendours of Royal Mysore: The Untold Story of the Wodeyars on the history of the royal family of Mysore.
He said, "Gauhar spent the last two years of her life in Mysore and in fact died there in 1930. The name seemed to have a certain ring to it that attracted me to her instantly."
The book traces this celebrated singer's journey right from her Anglo-Indian and Armenian roots to her conversion to Islam, to her making it to the prestigious soirees of the royal courts of India as a tawaif, to her achieving success as India's first gramophone star and finally her eventual doom.
A life less ordinary
Sampath, who is also trained in Carnatic music, found himself drawn to Gauhar Jaan also because she was the first Indian and woman who recorded on the gramophone and had quite a flamboyant life. He said, "The few snippets that I gathered about her life seemed to indicate a stormy and eventful life.
For someone who was a celebrity in her heyday all over the country, the fact that she had to resettle from distant Calcutta to Mysore, and that too on a measly pension, seemed to indicate that she had gone through a lot in life."u00a0
The Gramophone Queenu00a0
Apart from Gauhar's meteoric rise to fame with her brilliant singing and prowess at not only all forms of Hindustani music but also those from other cultures, perhaps the most interesting section of the book is where the discovery of the gramophone, its arrival in India and Gauhar's first recording is written about.
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The reader gets a sense of something big, coming up in the future, something that would change the course of history and the way we would listen to music.
Tales of Ostentation
The book is scattered with anecdotes of Gauhar and her trademark flamboyance.
She threw a party at the birth of a litter by her pet cat (that cost her a whopping Rs 20,000) or the time when she regularly flouted government regulations and went around Calcutta in a four horse driven buggy (commoners were not allowed to do that) and paid a handsome fine of Rs 1000.
She also refused to pay half of the total amount raised during a concert for the Congress party because Mahatma Gandhi, who had invited her to sing, couldn't come to her concert as promised.
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According to Sampath, if one thinks classical music is relevant today, then Gauhar's music certainly is.
He said, "In these days of gizmos and gadgets, if we are to see the journey the recording industry has traced, then Gauhar serves as a perfect prototype as the pioneer who brought forth this technological revolution, being the first to record."
Gauhar Jaan braved odds, disregarded threats and superstitions that abounded related to recording and went ahead and that totally transformed the nature, content, style and presentation of Indian classical music.
Book My Name is Gauhar Jaan: The Life and Times of a Musician
Authoru00a0u00a0 Vikram Sampath
price Rs 595
Available at Crossword, Landmark & Reliance Time Out
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