Strand Three Profiles and Interviews - Mr. Himangshu Goswami

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Mr. Himangshu Goswami

Age: 54

Interview date: 05 _ Apr _ 06

Interviewed by: Jamil Iqbal

Mr. Goswami is a household name for Bengali families in the UK. Composer of ‘Sadher Lau’, a song second only to the national anthem in its popularity for Bengalis,He was born in Sylhet and trained as a classical singer, before turning to folk and traditional songs. He built a successful career, teaching and performing in Bangladesh until 1978, when he was invited to tour London.That first concert in a cinema in London’s Brick Lane was highly successful and with a personal recommendation from Ravi Shankar, he agreed to stay in the UK. Since then he has performed with George Harrison, Ali Akbar Khan,and worked with Ravi Shankar on the soundtrack for ’Gandhi’.

Himangshu Goswami

Q: How and why did you get involved in music?
It is in my blood, my mother is and was a good singer, she is 82 now and she is still a good singer. At our home we had an environment for music that is why I signed up from the very first day of my life. Later I learned music at my home. When I was in class 5 or 6, my parents brought me to a town, for a better education. Thus I came to Sylhet town. My mother seeing my enthusiasm in music took me to Sylhet Academy of Fine Arts (SAFA) for getting training on music. One Sur Sagar Pranesh Das and another Ustad Hossain Ali taught me music. They were both prominent musicians of Sylhet. I got training from them for two or three years, and afterwards I went to other music teachers of Sylhet. Then I started to perform in programme.

Himangshu Goswami, 2006

After few years the Pakistan Arts Council was formed, we started to attend programme arranged by the organisation. They used to organise competition of music in all the four district of the Sylhet Division. The winner of that competition used to participate in the central competition in Sylhet. The winner of the Sylhet competition, used to be selected for the national competition in Dhaka. I won many prizes then. I have learnt from many Guru & Ustads and I am grateful to them. The situation of Sylhet was a lot better then, at that time there were many good singers in Sylhet, I believe there are still many in Sylhet but they are not spending their effort on culture and education. I want to name some of the people like Daru Miah Mohammed Yousuf, he was the chairman of the municipality. The next to name is Aminur Rashid Chowdhury, owner of tea gardens and the newspaper Jugabary. Nirmol Chowdhury was there who the Pakistani Army killed in 1971. Kabi Delwar and many other people were there who used to nurture the cultural activities. They used to inspire the new comers in the music world to learn more. They played a great role in music, drama and all the cultural activities in Sylhet. They should be credited for the role they played. I want to credit them for all my achievements.

Q: How did you get interested in pastoral music?
At the beginning of my music life, I learned the classical music (Raga) at first. The first time I sang songs of Nazrul, high profile classical Nazrul; so I started to sing Nazrul. In 1969, I attended an interview in the East Pakistan Radio in Sylhet and I qualified for that. I started in the radio with Nazrul Geeti (songs). They recorded the song and gave a date to air the music. I went to the village with a joyful heart, and told everybody about the time of the programme. When the song was aired, I went to those who listened to my song and wanted their opinion. They said, “We don’t want to listen to these sorts of classical music, you better try the Polli Geeti, Loko Sangeet, pastoral music, and so on”.

I then realized that the general people will not like the classical music as much as they will love the Loko Sangeet, Batiyali etc and I also was convinced that I should sing for the people, and that will be the best use of my skills. So I started to sing Loko Sangeet. I started pastoral music and then the Liberation War of Bangladesh started. After the liberation some of my friends like Himangshu Biswas, Akramul Islam and some other friends started a music school in Sylhet. Ansar Ahmed Ullah’s (of Swadhinata Trust) family had a large house, which was empty as they were staying in Britain. We started our music school in that house, the name of the school was Nabarag Music School. We were too young then, so we requested Prof. Shafiq of Madan Mohon College to be the principal of the Nabarag. So we started the school, the two sisters of Ansar Ullah (Emily and Janet) used to sing and dance in that school with others. That was the beginning of my music life. We formed a Loko Geeti group in Sylhet. It was the very beginning of Bangladesh, we came from India and my home was destroyed and that’s why I was staying in the home of Prof. Shafiq, he was maternal uncle of Ansar Ullah. In our Sylhet Loko Sangeet Dal (group) we included Bidit Lal Das, he was also known as Patalda. He was senior to us, and the legendary Subir Nandi was in our group. In 1973, there was a Loko Sangeet Union held at Dhaka, in that programme many groups from all the country attended. We sang the song written by Giyas Uddin Ahmed, ‘Sylhet Prothom Azan Dhoni Babay Diachen’ and some other songs. Kabi Jasim Uddin was the chief guest; he was so pleased with us that we used to sing the songs in-group. And most of the time I was the leader.

This experience gave us a huge lift; we got popularity even at national level. We were the only music group without a woman. I collected the song “Shader lao…” It was incomplete then and I requested the writer of the ‘Sylhet Prothom Azan Dhoni Babay Diachen’ to edit it and modify it. He added 4 more sentences. And the song was super hit in Bangladesh. Runa Laila and others also sang the song later.

We were also invited to perform in the Banga Bhabon (President’s Palace); all the national leaders of Bangladesh were present including Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, Gen Osmani and others. We four got on the stage and started to sing, the president and others were very pleased hearing our music. When Zia came to power, we also got invited to the hotel Sheraton to perform. Zia, Ershad and many others were admirers of our group.

Two traditional genre of music touch the soul of every Bengali; one is Loko Sangeet, and the other is Kirton. This music is the music of the general people of Bangladesh. This is the indigenous music of Bangladesh, and this helps people to get energy, to get inspiration and all the specialized professional musicians had their own rhythm and music in Bangladesh. The Bangla Loko Sangeet has its music for various purposes, and it is the best in the world.

All these brought me to the music. I am here in Britain for 30 years; I went to Canada, India, Spain and many other countries to perform Loko Sangeet.

Q: What was the situation of music in Britain when you first came to UK?
I came here with a delegation to perform in a programme. In the first show all the Bengali people came from all over Britain and there were hundreds of people outside the hall who didn’t get any tickets. The people at that time were more conscious and more conscious of music. The new generation people don’t know the main theme or the writer or the singer of the songs. They only listen to the music, but the people in the past were more conscious and concerned.

Q: Tell us about the Melas in Britain.
I have performed in Melas arranged by the Bengali community here in Britain. But I think the standard of the music in Melas should be better. We need to encourage our culture by these sorts of programmes. For example the Bengali food is so popular in Britain now; but our music and culture is not moving ahead, it is facing stagnation to my opinion. The state is also responsible for this, and also the community have to play a big role in this sector. The state has to ensure proper and good quality education in music. But our Bangladesh government is not giving attention to this issue. Why is the same music performed again and again? Because we don’t have the quality. Recently some young people got interested to learn more about culture and music; I have found one (Bengali) Sylheti student studying music in the Baroda University in India. We need to develop infrastructure and facility in our own country. In Britain the culture is being practiced but it is not developing at a pace that is needed to fight the challenges of the new age.

The new generation is listening to the music including the Bengali music, but the extent is not enough. We are unable to fulfil the demand of our new generation i.e. the third generation of youths here in Britain. They are still listening to the music of Abdul Karim and other musicians of the 1970s and 1980s. The music is a bit changed by the use of the modern instruments but the song is the same.

Q: Tell us about the Young generation musician.
We don’t have a good quality music school or music institution here in Tower Hamlets. Many of the boys and girls want to learn music, but they are not getting the proper resources and facilities. Some of the institutes are there but they are all guided by some political ideology. One has to get the trust to send his or her children to an institute, to learn something. We have to have good quality teachers and good management and of course good ideology that is independent from politics. We don’t have any good quality institution of music in Britain. Some of the good artists will still come out but we have to improve the situation.

Q: Which type of Bangladeshi music is popular in Britain?
Folk music and the Hason Raja and these sorts of music are popular in Britain. We can’t have name and fame, singing in English in Britain. We don’t have the element of sex and violence in our music; we have Sufi music and this type of music in Bangla. The music which touches the heart which is the pure music.

Q: Do you have to tell us anything?
I will appeal to you people who are involved in the oral history project; to reveal the true history of our independence war and the movement, as you know the situation in Bangladesh.

Being a musician I am a servant of music; I want the music of the 1971 era to be recorded and preserved well. There is an American company, which is recording the music of all the renowned artists of the present day. They will market the music after a long time. I want the music of 1971 to be preserved for the next generation of Bangladeshi. There are songs of 1971 not known by the present day Bengalis, but I want them to be preserved; even by using the latest types of musical instruments. I also appeal to all to produce a very good quality cinema based on 1971.

Our nation is an emotional one, we need to develop ourselves and work for our nation.