I'm originally from India, Delhi, but myself and my family settled down in Kathmandu, Nepal
for the last 15 years, so I basically belonged to India.
My father was a musician by profession, so it is inherited basically in the family itself.
My grandfather was a musician, my grandfather was a musician, so it's like 6th generation,
me in a 6th generation right now.
So it is basically coming as a traditional, so that is pretty natural.
You are in the family, you are treated, always the music happening all the time and every
weekend we used to go for the classical music in different places and always music is a
part and parcel of our life and at home also father used to play all hours there, so we
used to hear him.
Well learning started right from the beginning itself because that time I was a boy and you
know how a boy behaves, he never sits at one place going here and there, but music was
always there going on because all great musicians like Pandit Ravishank, my father, Ustad Amir
Khan and then so many other great musicians of India have been hearing so much in the
house concerts in a closed gathering, so it was bound to happen, the inside was happening
already.
Yeah, it was like we were never aware of the fact that it was going to be a destiny, but
you know it was going along, so it happened like this actually and it was so natural because
it was a family, so it came so naturally everything was so easy because playing intricate ragas
and raganis happening with a tabla player is there, so it was very natural happening
so it becomes destiny itself.
Our family instrument is sitar, my father was a sitarist, my brother is also a professor
of sitar in Delhi city teaching, quite obvious that the sitar was the first instrument, but
then I like Sarod, the sound, the deafness and all that so I opted for Sarod and I asked
my father why can't I have one Sarod and he said okay fine and one day he came, I was
that time very young, he came with the Sarod, this one, this is a gift from my father, my
father's love gift and he brought this and then he said okay here it is, now it's all
yours, then I started practicing and then I get into it and then I started playing and
then become one with, I hope I become one with this.
My father himself, I mean what we are learning is basically the Indian ragas, instrument
definitely matters, the fingering matters definitely, the fingering is different, so
these are the basic things you know which I have learnt and I have seen Ustad Aliyev
Burkha playing, so I know the fingerings and the rest is the main thing is the ragas and
ragas needs to be played, so that's all my father did and he taught me and this is how
it came to, yeah but it was pretty natural, I've been seeing my father playing all through
and I've been going to the concerts, my brother playing, so it was like kind of a traditional
kind of a thing happening, so it was the hitch of awareness of people are there to listen
to it, you don't see the people, you see as if it's a part of yours and you become one
with that, so it becomes pretty natural, I will never be scared of people because they
are part of me, so the music came into this, not as you know I'm scared about the crowd
or people, but it naturally came, you know because everyone, I was watching my father
playing so comfortably and my brother playing so comfortably on the stage for thousands
of people around, so that thing inherited it, I think probably that's how it is, yeah
I remember it was long back, I was performing, I was young at that point of time and that
time it was basically you know when you sit somewhere and sum up and try to play as you
have to go inside and close your eyes, the best way for me is to close my eyes and then
get into it, you know, I played it around say when I was around 19 years old kind of
thing, 18 or 19, I played it first time, well goal is for music we cannot set a goal, especially
talking in terms of the classical music, it's just a soulful, there's no word, it's just
instrument, so it is very difficult to say there's a goal, it's a transcending factor
and every time you play you are transcending and this has never been that I reach certain
this thing or going to better, it's always new thing for me, it's a new test, new exam,
every time I play it's like new exam, new test, so it's never ending process, so there's
no set goal at all, it's a transcending.
This is around 15 years back, there was kind of a thing I came to Kathmandu for a certain
project and 1994, first time Stretchenmoi was there in Nepal and though I didn't realize
now I realize the fact that there was kind of a destiny somewhere and I couldn't see
him at that point of time but in 1999 he came and then I saw him and then I got fascinated
and well attracted, fascinated or hooked up, whatever you could put it as and I become
part of that and then you know that is now I can remember the whole story, there's always
a destiny to be there because I never wanted to be in Nepal you know when you come from
Delhi going to Nepal is very smaller, so I feel like you know going back and the same
stream but once I come there and then I see Stretchenmoi then it becomes you know be here
kind of a thing, feel good about it.
Initially even I can't describe the meaning of going into this spirituality in a full
swing in a sense that I didn't know much about this, I didn't study, I didn't look
for Guru, frankly speaking then once I saw Guru then my something there was a big energy
like a magnet somewhere I felt inside Stretchenmoi Guru, so that attracted me and then I try
to learn step by step it's like a toddler walking, you're teaching a small kid how
to run or how to walk, it's the same way happened with me also, though I've grown up
but you know I was like a toddler in terms of spirituality so I didn't know not even
a single ABCD about the spirituality, I've heard about, I've read about but this is
total, spirituality is a complete yoga, it has to be learnt, it has to be felt, it has
to be imbibed, it has to be inherited from master itself, it's not that easy so unless
Guru is not there it was not possible, so that is how I'm slowly learning, it's basically
a journey and it's pacing me and it's helping me in my music as well to make the music
more divine, more godly, more like beyond words, so I play for him and that is how the
music goes on.
Music is basically initially a self motivated art, more you please yourself, more I please
myself, more I please you and more deeply I go, more deeply as within and without, it's
within me happening and without me happening inside you when I play, so more deep I go,
more deep you go and this is how the relationship between a listener and the player, sometimes
the listener becomes also a player and the player becomes a listener because it's a two-way
contact and this is how the oneness contact of the Supreme, the God we call it as, so it's
the best language as we call in our general language is music is a universal language
of God, this is what it means if I relate to that universal language of God, music is
a second step to meditation which transcend you or transport you to the higher consciousness
in silence, the silence itself is a soundless sound and that transports us very easily and
then we reach a state of silence very much because once we are from the sound world should
go through the sound world to the soundless world, for that we need a kind of a vehicle
so the music we use as a vehicle, as a transport to take us to the silence sound world.
Well I met him in a peace concert in Kathmandu and it was a salty crown plaza and that was
a meeting around 10-15 minutes we were there and I really like his presence, his energies
and he was beaming with energy and he played so many instruments before us and that really
attracted me and a person who has so much to contribute the paintings, charnakalas
and music and so many dimensions one person can as cute I haven't seen anyone so that
really attracted me and it was like a magnet attracted me and then I become close to him
and I really liked him.
He called us to come forward and meditated on us and then it was very moving, very special
moment for me to become part of the spiritual family.
Guru's music is basically is all written and composed for divine and the words used
in Bengali, mostly in the native language English also, it's all selective and purposely
Guru has used this for highest, for the supreme or God you can put it as.
So the consciousness in Guru's songs and music is very high and that transports you
to the very highest pretty easily, Guru knows that it is the music which can transport easily
people ahead and well you say about the classical music what I play is basically I feel the
same music but it looks, it sounds simple but at the same time it transports us, at
the same time it transports us to the higher consciousness and the consciousness is very
high when we sing along with the songs like so many songs like 23,000 songs all together
more than that even so it is like even if you sing few songs every day it give you
a kind of a upliftment in terms of consciousness.
So for myself now music not, it is not a worldly music I am not just feeling that I am playing
for audience I am playing for Gods inside the people so here it relates, I relate this
Guru's music helping me to relate the music to God, God within and God without, his music
helps us, his writing helps us to transport us to the soundless sound world which is his
world and then he directs, then he because he directs even in oneness like we play all
together or the disciples come play together and that is his message, the oneness love
the whole world is one in peace, oneness and that is where speaks the language of, universal
language of God and the love, the divine love among us is a message of Guru and even if
he is not in physical I do not feel like he is not there, he may not be seen physically
but he is there to guide us, so there is a soundless sound, we call it as anahatnaad
is a Sanskrit word called anahatnaad he is speaking to us in and through each and every
disciple he loves each and every disciple in the whole world through his soundless sound
music, music
