ANNAPURNA DEVI ... 5

ANNAPURNA DEVI ... 5

Annapurna Devi was the greatest musician produced by Baba Allauddin Khan. She was the greatest instrumentalist of the 20th century of the generation of Ustad Vilayat Khan, Pt. Ravi Shankar, Ustad Ali Akbar Khan and a host of other leading lights of the music world. This I have concluded, of course, after hearing a few pieces of her recorded music and the renditions of her disciples like Pt. Nityanand Haldipur, Pt. Basant Kabra and Pt. Hariprasad Chaurasia among others. There is a singular beauty to the pieces played by her disciples, from the depth of the alaap to the melodic sublimity in the gats of unparalleled aesthetic delight. This is my assessment and no verdict that others must abide by. I am moved by her music coming through her disciples. How much more moving must have been her own music played by her own hands on the surbahar and the sitar and rendered by her super-sweet voice, music that so delighted her Guru and father, Baba Allauddin Khan, that he revelled one day in ecstatic delight to articulate thus : "When Annapurna plays the surbahar, it seems Mother Saraswati is playing it." What more may I say after this?

Written by Sugata Bose