Various ragas presented till dawn

Indian sitarist Purbayan Chatterjee and flutist Rakesh Chaurasia present a duet recital at Abahani playground in Dhanmondi on Wednesday early morning.

Different North and South Indian ragas were presented by a Bangladeshi and six Indian classical musicians till Wednesday dawn at Abahani Limited’s playground in Dhanmondi.
Over 20 thousand audience members enjoyed presentations of ragas like anil madhyam, kedar, lalit, desh, bageshree, jhinjhoti, malkuans and others performed by top musicians of the region with different instruments and vocal recitals on the opening day of Bengal Classical Music Festival.
The sixth edition of Bengal Classical Music Festival commenced on Tuesday evening with Indian violin legend L Subramaniam’s solo presentation of raga abhogi, a combination of North Indian and South Indian classical styles.
Since then the show continued till the Wednesday morning apart from a brief inauguration ceremony attended by ministers like finance minister Abul Maal Abdul Muhith, information minister Hasanul Haque Inu, cultural affairs minister Asaduzzaman Noor, professor emeritus Dr Anisuzzaman, Bengal Foundation Chairman Abul Khair and others.
Followed by Subramaniam, Kazakh music company Astana Symphony Philharmonic Orchestra presented ten sonatas composed by Kazakh and western composers like Beethoven, Tchaikovsky and others.
The orchestra also performed with Subramaniam.
Rajrupa Chowdhury played raga anil madhyam on sarod. Pandit Avijit Bannerjee accompanied her during the performance with tabla.
Vidushi Padma Talwalkar took the stage next. Ankita Deole provided vocal support during her performance, while Sanjay Adhikary was on Tabla and Rupashree Bhattacharya was on harmonium. She performed raga kedar. After that, she performed Tarana in raga desh, meera bhajan and raga bageshree.
The following performance was done by Bangladeshi sitarist Firoz Khan. Zakir Hossain accompanied him on tabla.
He performed raga jhinjhoti and dhun.
Supriya Das, an exponent of Khayal, was the penultimate performer of the show. She rendered Khayal in raga malkuans and thumri in raga desh. Prashanta Bhowmik accompanied him on tabla and Gourob Chatterjee was on harmonium.
The last performance of the first night of the five-day festival was a duet by Rakesh Chaurasia on flute and Purbayan Chatterjee on sitar. Pandit Abhijit Banerjee accompanied them on tabla.
They performed raga lalit; alap jor jhala and gat. They also performed bhairavi dhun. Bengal Classical Music Festival is the largest classical music event in the subcontinent showcasing performances from over two hundred classically trained singers and dancers. It has been organised with the goal to popularise and perpetuate the practice of classical music.
The event this year is dedicated to eminent educationist, researcher and cultural exponent professor emeritus Dr Anisuzzaman.