The sarod is a stringed musical instrument, used mainly in Indian classical music. Along with the sitar, it is the most popular and prominent instrument in Hindustani (northern Indian, Bangladeshi and Pakistani ) classical music. The sarod is known for a deep, weighty, introspective sound (contrast with the sweet, overtone-rich texture of the sitar) with sympathetic strings that give it a resonant, reverberant quality. It is a fretless instrument able to produce the continuous slides between notes known as meend (glissandi), which are very important to Indian music.

Origins

The sarod is believed by some to have descended from the Afghan rubab, a similar instrument originating in Central Asia and Afghanistan. It is Indian The name Sarod roughly translates to "beautiful sound" or "melody" in Persian (which is one of the many languages spoken in Afghanistan). Although the sarod has been referred to as a "bass rebab" its pitch range is only slightly lower than that of the rubab. Lalmani Misra opines in his Bharatiya Sangeet Vadya that the sarod is an amalgamation of the ancient chitra veena, the medieval rebab and modern sursingar. There is also a speculation that the oud may be the origin of the sarod. Among the many conflicting and contested histories of the Sarod, there is one that attributes its invention to the ancestors of the present-day Sarod maestro, Amjad Ali Khan. Amjad Ali Khan’s ancestor Mohammad Hashmi Khan Bangash, a musician and horsetrader, came to India with the Afghan rabab in the mid-18th century and became a court musician to the Maharajah of Rewa (now in Madhya Pradesh). It was his descendants—notably his grandson Ghulam Ali Khan Bangash who became a court musician in Gwalior -- who gradually pepo the rabab into the sarod we know today.. A parallel theory credits descendants of Madar Khan (1701–1748) -- Niyamatullah Khan in particular—with the same innovation circa 1820. It is possible that Ghulam Ali Khan and Niyamatullah Khan came to the similar design propositions either independently or in unacknowledged collaboration. The sarod in its present recognizable form dates back to c.1820, when it started gaining recognition as a serious instrument in Rewa, Shahjahanpur, Gwalior and Lucknow. In the 20th century, the sarod received some finishing touches from Allauddin Khan, the performer-pedagogue from Maihar best known as Ravi Shankar and Ali Akbar Khan's guru.

Design

The design of the instrument depends on the school (gharana) of playing. There are three distinguishable types, discussed below.

The conventional sarod is an 17 to 19-stringed lute-like instrument — four to five main strings used for playing the melody, one or two drone strings, two chikari strings and nine to eleven sympathetic strings. The design of this early model is generally credited to Niyamatullah Khan of the Lucknow Gharana as well as Ghulam Ali Khan of the Gwalior-Bangash Gharana. Among the contemporary sarod players, this basic design is kept intact by two streams of sarod playing. Amjad Ali Khan and his disciples play this model, as do the followers of Radhika Mohan Maitra. Both Amjad Ali Khan and Buddhadev Dasgupta have introduced minor changes to their respective instruments which have become the design templates for their followers. Both musicians use sarods made of teak wood, with the playing face covered with goat skin. Buddhadev Dasgupta prefers a polished stainless steel fingerboard for the ease of maintenance while Amjad Ali Khan uses the conventional chrome or nickel-plated cast steel fingerboard. Visually, the two variants are similar, with six pegs in the main pegbox, two rounded chikari pegs and 11 (Amjad) to 15 (Buddhadev) sympathetic strings. The descendants of Niyamatullah Khan (namely Irfan Khan and Ghulfam Khan) also play similar instruments. The followers of Radhika Mohan Maitra still carry the second resonator on their sarods. Amjad Ali Khan and his followers have rejected the resonator altogether. These instruments are typically tuned to B, which is the traditional setting.

(Two of the earliest sarodes are still in concert circulation. These are the sarodes built for Niyamatullah Khan (c. 1840) and for Murad Ali Khan (c. 1860). Both have seen extensive use for over five generations, and are in perfect playing condition. As a result of the resurgence of these two early prototypes, the theories that proclaim the 20th-century variants to represent the zenith of sarod design, face a serious and credible challenge. The Murad Ali sarod, in particular, has acoustic sustain and projection that surpasses those of modern variants by a considerable margin. On this sarod, it is possible to sustain meends of up to ten whole tones on one string, with just one downward stroke.)

Another type is that designed by Allauddin Khan and his brother Ayet Ali Khan. This instrument, referred by David Trasoff (Trasoff, 2000) as the 1934 Maihar Prototype, is larger and longer than the conventional instrument, though the fingerboard is identical to the traditional sarod described above. This instrument has 25 strings in all. These include four main strings, four jod strings (tuned to Ni or Dha, R/r, G/g and Sa respectively), two chikari strings (tuned to Sa of the upper octave) and fifteen tarab strings. The main strings are tuned to Ma ("fa"), Sa ("do"), lower Pa ("so") and lower Sa, giving the instrument a range of three octaves. The Maihar sarod lends itself extremely well to the presentation of alap with the four jod strings providing a backdrop that helps usher in the ambience of the raga. This variant is, however, not conducive to the performance of clean right-hand picking on individual strings. The instrument is typically tuned to C.

Sarod strings are made either of steel or phosphor bronze. Most contemporary sarod players use Roslau, Schaff or Precision brand music wire. The strings are plucked with a triangular plectrum (java) made of polished coconut shell, ebony, Delrin^TM or other materials such as bone.

Playing

The lack of frets and the tension of the strings make the sarod a very demanding instrument to play, as the strings must be pressed hard against the fingerboard.

There are two approaches to stopping the strings of the sarod. One involves using the tip of one's fingernails to stop the strings; certain strength and stiffness of the fingernails is a prerequisite for accuracy of pitch. The other uses a combination of the nail and the fingertip to stop the strings against the fingerboard.

Abdullah Khan (1849–1928) ^{Court Musician of Darbhanga and Dacca}

Asadullah Khan "Kaukav" (1852–1919)

Fida Hussain Khan (1855–1927) ^{Court Musician of Rampur}

Ghulam Ali Bangash (c. 1790-1858) ^{Court Musician of Gwalior}

Karamatullah Khan (1848–1933) ^{Court Musician of Nepal}

Mohammad Amir Khan (1873–1934) ^{Court Musician of Darbhanga and Rajshahi}

Murad Ali Khan (c. 1825-1905) ^{Court Musician of Gwalior and Darbhanga}

Niyamatullah Khan (1809–1911) ^{Court Musician of Bundi, Alwar and finally Lucknow}

Shafayat Ali Khan (1838–1915)

20th century greats

Aashish Khan (b. 1939)

Ali Akbar Khan (1922–2009)

Allaudin Khan (1880–1972)

Amjad Ali Khan (b. 1945)

Gurdev Singh (b. 1948)

Buddhadev Das Gupta (b. 1933)

Hafiz Ali Khan (1888–1972)

Shahadat Hossain Khan (b. 1958)

Sharan Rani Backliwal (1929–2008)

Radhika Mohan Maitra (1917–1981)

Vasant Rai (1942–1985)

Zarine Sharma (b. 1946)

Pt Sunil Mukherjee

Sarang Kulkarni (b.1990)

Abhisek Lahiri

Anupam Joshi

Abhishek Borkar (b.1992)

Aditya Verma

Alam Khan (b.1982)

Alok Lahiri(b.1958)

Amaan Ali Khan (b. 1977)

Amit Goswami (b. 1971)

Amitava Majumdar

Anirban Dasgupta

Anindya Banerjee (b. 1958)

Aniruddha Andrew Vasant Rai (USA)

Anupam Shobhakar (b. 1979)

Arnab Chakrabarty

Asad Qizilbaksh - Pakistan

Ayaan Ali Khan (b. 1979)

Avijit Ghosh

Basant Kabra

Bhabani Shankar Dasgupta (b. 1961)

Biswajit Roy Chowdhury (b. 1956)

Debanjan Bhattacharya

Debojyoti Bose (b. 1962)

Gulfam Ahmad Khan (b. 1956)

Harsh Amin (b. 1982)

Irfan Muhammad Khan (b. 1954)

Joydeep Ghosh

K. Sridhar

Kalyan Mukherjee (Not the same as Kalyan Mukherjea.)

Ken Zuckerman (Switzerland)

Montino Bourbon (California)

Mukesh Sharma

Musarrat Ali Khan

Narendranath Dhar (b. 1958)

Partho Sarothy (Sarathy Chowdhury) (b. 1960)

Praashekh Borkar (b. 1987)

Prabhu Tendolkar

Pradeep Barot

Pramantha Mohun Tagore (b. 1991)

Prattyush Banerjee (b. 1969)

Puspen Dey

Rajan Kulkarni

Rajeeb Chakraborty (b. 1963)

Rajeev Taranath (b. 1932)

Rajrupa Sen (b. 1982)

Ranajit Sengupta

Satyam Vasant Rai (b. 1982)

Srimati Sharan Rani (1929–2008)

Shekhar Borkar

Soumik Datta (UK)

Suro Ranjan (b.1961)

Susmit Sil (b. 1981)

Tejendra Majumdar (b. 1961)

Vikash Maharaj (b. 1957)

Wali Ahmad Roufi

See also

Sitar

Plucked string instrument

Hindustani classical music

Music of India

String instruments

References

Category:Drumhead lutes Category:Hindustani musical instruments Category:Necked bowl lutes Category:String instruments with sympathetic strings Category:Sarod players

Name	Amjad Ali
Title	Member of House of Representatives (Fiji) Nadi Urban Indian Communal Constituency
Term start	1999
Term end	2006
Successor	Gunasagaran Gounder
Title2	Nadi Open Constituency
Term start2	2006
Term end2	2006
Predecessor2	Krishna Prasad
Successor2	vacant
Party	Fiji Labour Party
Religion	Muslim

:For the UAE cricketer of the same name see Amjad Ali (cricketer)

Amjad Ali is a Fiji Indian politician. In the House of Representatives he represented the Nadi Urban Indian Communal Constituency, one of 19 reserved for Indo-Fijians, from 1999 to 2006, having held the seat for the Fiji Labour Party (FLP) in the general elections of 1999 and 2001. At the 2006 general election, he transferred to the Nadi Open Constituency and held it for the FLP.

On 19 May 2000, He was among the 43 members of the People's Coalition Government, led by Mahendra Chaudhry, taken hostage by George Speight and his band of rebel Republic of Fiji Military Forces (RFMF) soldiers from the Counter Revolutionary Warfare Unit. He was released on 13 July 2000 after 56 days of captivity.

He had made an unsuccessful attempt to win the Nadi Urban Indian Communal seat in the 1994 general elections, losing to his National Federation Party opponent.

References

Category:Indo-Fijian people Category:Nadi people Category:Fiji Labour Party politicians Category:Members of the Fijian House of Representatives Category:Fijian Muslims Category:Living people

Mohammad Akbar Khan (1813–1845) was an Afghan Prince, a general and a tribal leader. He was active in the First Anglo-Afghan War, which lasted from 1839 to 1842. He is prominent for his leadership of the national party in Kabul from 1841 to 1842, and his pursuit of the retreating British army from Kabul to Gandamak near Jalalabad in 1842. He is also known for killing legendary Sikh leader Hari Singh Nalwa in the 1837 Battle of Jamrud whilst trying to get back the city of Peshawar for the Afghans from the invading Sikh army.

Akbar was the son of Amir Dost Mohammad Khan of Afghanistan, and he led a revolt in Kabul against the British Indian mission of William McNaughten, Alexander Burnes and their garrison of 4,500 men. In November 1841, he besieged Major-General William Elphinstone's force in Kabul. Elphinstone accepted a safe-conduct for his force and about 12,000 associated workers to flee to India; they were ambushed and massacred. It was claimed in at least one set of British war memoirs that, during the retreat, Akbar Khan could be heard alternately commanding his men, in Persian language to desist from, and in Pashto language to continue, firing.

Historians think it unlikely that Akbar Khan wished for the total annihilation of the British force. An astute man politically, he would have been aware that allowing the British to extricate themselves from Afghanistan would give him the time to consolidate his control of the diverse hill tribes; whereas a massacre of 14,000 people, of which only about a quarter were a fighting force, would not be tolerated back in London and would result in another, larger army sent to exact retribution. This was in fact what happened the following year.

Many believe that Akbar Khan was poisoned by his father, Dost Mohammed, who feared his ambitions.

In fiction

The historical figure of Akbar Khan plays a major role in George MacDonald Fraser's novel ''Flashman. No factual reference base for killing of Sardar Hari Singh Nalwa, however the Peshwar Gazzette of 1897 clearly shows that gulab singh Hindu dogra, forgave the tax owed by yar Mohamed barukzai which sardar hari singh had originally come to collect, it is also written by a kin of the dogras that hari singh stood in the way of dogra ruling dream so while during chase of the retreating armies of Kabul he was shot in the back fact by gulab singh's man, another fact the Afghans in the siege were repulsed and unsuccessful.

References

External links

Category:Pashtun people Category:1813 births Category:1845 deaths

Subhankar Banerjee (born 1967) is an artist, educator and activist whose images of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and other Alaskan wild lands have captured international attention.

Born in Berhampore, India, Banerjee received his bachelor's degree in engineering before moving to the United States, where he received master's degrees in physics and computer science. He worked in scientific fields for six years at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico and Boeing in Seattle. In 2000 his childhood passion for art, coupled with a deep love and concern for the wilderness and disappearing indigenous cultures, caused him to leave his career in science and pursue art. Since then he has focused all his efforts on indigenous human rights and land conservation issues in the Arctic.

In 2001 Banerjee began the first of two years of ground-breaking year-around field photography in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. The photos he took were published in the book Seasons of Life and Land. Banerjee’s photographs of the Refuge were exhibited at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History, and controversy erupted when his captions for the photos were altered and the exhibit was moved to a far corner of the museum. Senator Richard J. Durbin and others in Congress felt that the Smithsonian had been pressured, probably by Alaska Senator Ted Stevens, to remove the exhibit from the spotlight because Senator Barbara Boxer had held up Banerjee’s book during a Senate floor debate over oil drilling in the Refuge. The museum maintained the changes were made “for artistic reasons”. Since that exhibit Banerjee's work has catapulted to the top of many gallery and museum lists, and this and other work has been exhibited and collected by museums around the world.

Banerjee has received many awards for his Arctic work including an inaugural Greenleaf Artist Award from the United Nations Environment Programme and an inaugural Cultural Freedom Fellowship from the Lannan Foundation. Banerjee will be Artist-in-Residence at Dartmouth College during the 2009 winter term, and during fall Sea Change Artist-Activist Resident of the Gaea Foundation.

Notes

External links

Subhanker Banerjee's web site

Artists of the Arctic Refuge: Subhanker Banerjee

Seattleite Subhankar Banerjee's photos of Arctic 'Life and Land' are winning hearts

Audio file: Subhankar Banerjee discussing his photography and the indigenous peoples of the Arctic

Authors@Google: Subhankar Banerjee

Category:Nature photographers Category:People from West Bengal Category:Living people Category:Indian photographers Category:American photographers Category:1967 births

Asad Qizilbash is a Pakistani Sarod player.

Biography

Asad was born in 1963 to the famous violinist K.H. Qizilbash, who introduced many talented Pakistani musicians to the world, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan among others.

After attending a concert performed by India’s most legendary Sarod player, Amjad Ali Khan, Asad decided to devote himself to the instrument. As a result Asad listened to many recordings by Amjad Ali Khan, practising the Sarod and putting his mind and soul into it. The discovery of his master’s live performance became the paradigm for his music. In 1992 Asad became the only recognised Sarod player in the country and five years later he received Ganda Band Shagerd of Ustad Amjad Ali Khan in New Delhi.

1973

Asad Qizilbash started learning violin when he was around 8 years old. At 10 years age, he was asked to perform in a function patronized by UNICEF: "The Universal Children Day", Islamabad. It was his first public performance.

1975

Asad Qizilbash became a performing member of the Children's Art Workshop" at the Pakistan National Council of Arts (PNCA). He was playing violin and the guitar. He remained member of this workshop till 1982, when he left for the Middle East. During those days he used to play daily at the workshop. At that same period, he signed a contract with the Pakistan Television PTV.

1981

Asad Qizilbash was selected with some other musicians to represent Pakistan at the Attaturk Festival, in Ankara. He was playing violin and guitar. This was an invitation from the Radio-Television authorities of Turkey. The same year he met Ustad Amjad Ali Khan in Pakistan, for the first time.

1983 and 1984

"KASBEY QAMAL", a television serie by PTV where Asad Qizilbash performed the Sarod and violin. "PANGNAT", a television series by the PTV where Asad Qizilbash was performing for the musical background

1990 and 1992

Sarod concerts at the Tagore Institute in Bonn, Federal Republic of Germany.

1993-94-97-98

Since his return to Pakistan in 1992, Asad Qizilbash is mainly playing the Sarod. His talent is largely recognized and he has performed already in four Rag Rang. These are very exclusive concerts reserved only for classical musicians of the highest level.

1993

"RASELAY LOG" a television series by the PTV where Asad Qizilbash was performing sarod.

1994

"SATNBY STUDIO", a special program run during the election campaign where Asad Qizilbash was participating in a music event with other musicians.

2000

Asad Qizilbash performs live at the Marcus Mingus Jazz Club in Brussels, Belgium.

2003

Asad performs for Peter Gabriel’s WOMAD in the UK.

2005

Chinese Minister of Culture invites Asad to perform on the 7th Asia Art Festival in Foshan.

2006

Asad Qizilbash performs live at the Tree & Leaf in Brussels and at the Dranouter Festival for the Pax Mundial project with Patrick Riguelle and Jan Hautekiet. Asad also plays on the track 'Bodyless Friend' by Sutrastore (written by Christophe Calis).

2007

Asad Qizilbash signs a publishing, recording and production contract with womb Editions in Brussels.

Together with Andrew Goldberg (Producer, womb Editions) and Pely (Producer, Cut Productions), Asad recorded his first solo album, The Magic of the Sarod. From a total of 90 minutes of recorded music, Qizilbash performs live, fofur Ragas and one traditional Folk Tune ranging between early morning and midnight moods.

References

Category:1963 births Category:Living people Category:Pakistani singers

Name	Arnab Chakrabarty
Background	non_vocal_instrumentalist
Born	September 19, 1980
Origin	Mumbai, India
Instrument	Sarod
Genre	Indian classical music
Occupation	Sarod player

Arnab Chakrabarty (born September 19, 1980) is a Hindustani classical musician and sarod player.

Early life and education

Arnab Chakrabarty grew up in Mumbai, where his father was a professor of chemistry at the Indian Institute of Technology. His tutelage commenced under the Sarod exponent Brij Narayan, disciple of his father the Sarangi maestro Pandit Ram Narayan and also Ustad Ali Akbar Khan of the Seniya Maihar Gharana. Arnab subsequently trained under Pandit Buddhadev Das Gupta of the Shahjahanpur Gharana. Arnab continues an extended period of part-tutelage part-collaboration with Vinayak Chittar of this Gharana. He has also studied with a number of vocalists of the Agra and Gwalior Gharanas, notably Pandit Yeshwantbua Joshi.

Arnab had reverted to training under a master of the Shahjahanpur Gharana, Prof Kalyan Mukherjea, until Mukherjea's death in March 2010.

Performative career

Arnab has had several significant concerts. He made his solo debut in 1994, and won the National Collegiate Competition for Music and Dance three years in a row between 1995 and 1997.

References

Category:1980 births Category:Bengali musicians Category:Hindustani instrumentalists Category:Indian musicians Category:Sarod players Category:Living people