Kabir Suman (Bengali: কবীর সুমন, née Suman Chatyapadhyay; born 16 March 1949) is a Kolkata-based modern Bengali singer-songwriter, musician, poet, journalist, political activist, TV presenter, and occasional actor. Since May 2009, he is a member of parliament of India in the 15th Lok Sabha, having been elected from the Jadavpur constituency in Kolkata on an All India Trinamool Congress ticket.
He changed his name from Suman Chattopadhyay to 'Kabir Suman' (Bengali: কবীর সুমন) when he converted to Islam. He shot to fame in the 1990s with albums such as Tomake Chai (Bengali: তোমাকে চাই I Want You) and Boshe Anko (Bengali: বসে আঁকো Sit-and-Draw).
Suman was born on March 16, 1949 to Sudhindranath and Uma Chattopadhyay at Cuttack, Orissa. He was trained in classical music in his childhood, under the tutelage of this father. He graduated from Jadavpur University with an honours in English Literature and a diploma in French language. He then worked briefly in All India Radio and the United Bank of India. Suman left for Europe in the mid seventies, and worked as a radio journalist in the Voice of Germany (Bengali Dept.) from 1975-79. It is during this period that he heard the music of Bob Dylan in France, which became one of his most defining musical experiences.
Kabīr (also Kabīra) (Hindi: कबीर, Punjabi: ਕਬੀਰ, Urdu: کبير) (1440–1518) was a mystic poet and saint of India, whose writings have greatly influenced the Bhakti movement. The name Kabir comes from Arabic al-Kabīr which means 'The Great' - the 37th name of God in Islam.
Apart from having an important influence on Sikhism, Kabir's legacy is today carried forward by the Kabir Panth ("Path of Kabir"), a religious community that recognizes him as its founder and is one of the Sant Mat sects. Its members, known as Kabir panthis, are estimated to be around 9,600,000. They are spread over north and central India, as well as dispersed with the Indian diaspora across the world, up from 843,171 in the 1901 census. His writings include Bijak, Sakhi Granth, Kabir Granthawali and Anurag Sagar.
Not much is known of Kabir's birth parents, but it is known that he was brought up in a family of Muslim weavers. He was found by a Muslim weaver named Niru and his wife, Nima, in Lehartara, situated in Varanasi. They adopted the boy and taught him the weaver's trade.
Sabina Yasmin (Bengali: সাবিনা ইয়াসমীন; born 1953) is a Bangladeshi singer. She is renowned in Bangladesh for her patriotic songs as well as her playback singing in Bangladeshi cinema. She achieved many awards for her music in Bangladesh and has become an iconic[peacock term] figure in Bangladeshi music world.
Sabina started singing for films (soundtrack), radio, television and gramophone companies as a child. She has been active in the Bangladeshi music industry since 1970s. She is one of those few vocalists who is equally sought after in East Bengal (Bangladesh) as well as in West Bengal (in India). She has recorded more than some 10 thousand songs., April 2012
She established her position in the late 70s and early 80s with numerous patriotic songs and folk songs as well. Over the years she has also recorded with the composers of India including the R. D. Burman and sang duet with famous Indian singer Kishore Kumar.
She has made numerous concert tours in the UK, US, Canada, Italy, France, Bahrain, Qatar, Kuwait, Pakistan and Australia. In addition as a member of the Bangladesh National Cultural Delegations she has performed in China, Japan, Hong Kong, Thailand, Malaysia, India, UAE, Uzbekistan, Greece, Germany, Sweden and Norway.
Peter "Pete" Seeger (born May 3, 1919) is an American folk singer and an iconic figure in the mid-20th-century American folk music revival. A fixture on nationwide radio in the 1940s, he also had a string of hit records during the early 1950s as a member of The Weavers, most notably their recording of Lead Belly's "Goodnight, Irene", which topped the charts for 13 weeks in 1950. Members of The Weavers were blacklisted during the McCarthy Era. In the 1960s, he re-emerged on the public scene as a prominent singer of protest music in support of international disarmament, civil rights, and environmental causes.
As a song writer, he is best known as the author or co-author of "Where Have All the Flowers Gone?", "If I Had a Hammer (The Hammer Song)", (composed with Lee Hays of The Weavers), and "Turn, Turn, Turn!", which have been recorded by many artists both in and outside the folk revival movement and are still sung throughout the world. "Flowers" was a hit recording for The Kingston Trio (1962); Marlene Dietrich, who recorded it in English, German and French (1962); and Johnny Rivers (1965). "If I Had a Hammer" was a hit for Peter, Paul & Mary (1962) and Trini Lopez (1963), while The Byrds popularized "Turn, Turn, Turn!" in the mid-1960s, as did Judy Collins in 1964, and The Seekers in 1966. Seeger was one of the folksingers most responsible for popularizing the spiritual "We Shall Overcome" (also recorded by Joan Baez and many other singer-activists) that became the acknowledged anthem of the 1960s American Civil Rights Movement, soon after folk singer and activist Guy Carawan introduced it at the founding meeting of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in 1960. In the PBS "American Masters" episode Pete Seeger: The Power of Song, Seeger states it was he who changed the lyric from the traditional "We will overcome" to the more singable "We shall overcome".