000			01803nam a2200181Ia 4500
008			240822s9999 xx 000 0 und d
020			_a9788125064237 _qpbk
041			_aeng
082			_a780.92 _bJAY
100			_aJayita Sengupta
245		0	_aGandharvi: Life of A Musician _cJayita Sengupta and Bani Basu
250			_a1st ed.
260			_bOrent Blackswan _c2017 _aHyderabad
300			_axix, 267 p.
520			_aGandharvi: Life of a Musician, by the Sahitya Akademi Award-winning novelist Bani Basu (and translated by English scholar Jayita Sengupta), tells the story of Apala, a gifted singer of Hindustani classical music. She was born into an old, middle-class family of limited means in north Calcutta. To her family, her music meant little, as it did not fit their idea of ‘respectability’. Her husband ‘chose’ her after hearing her sing at a public concert, yet her marital life proved loveless. Her in-laws were insensitive and exploitative. Her children grew up learning to ignore their mother’s music. Shorn of freedom, love and, above all, music, Apala’s life moved towards a tragic end. Surrounding Apala’s story are the interlinked lives of other practitioners of music and classical art, like Soham, Mitul, Rameshwar Thakur, Dipali and Shekharan. Their lives intersected with Apala’s in ways that profoundly affected all of them. Written in lilting prose that draws on the idioms of Hindustani classical music, Gandharvi is also musical in its form, where in the end the movement of music and the life story of Apala become one and the same. A thinly veiled depiction of the classical music scene of Calcutta in the 1960s, this modern Bengali classic is also a celebration of the indomitable spirit of music.
650			_aMusic - Novel
942			_cENGLISH
999			_c526822 _d526822