The very first time I heard this song I was pierced by its melody. Its a folk song which evolved in the beginning of the 19th century. I always take enormous pleasure in singing it.

Wayfaring Stranger

I had newly joined a group called Melting Roots. We met for a rehearsal and a bassist started strumming a tune on his guitar. And that's how Dubi, dubi, daba began. I wanted then to find words to continue the songs, expressing my state of mind, my longing to sing, to belong and that's how it came about.

If you want to find

The song  Shukno Patar Nupur Paye is by Kabi Nazrul, a 19th century Bengali, poet, writer and. musician . It is  about the movement of the wind who wearing  anklets of dry leaves goes dancing over the waves. I've heard this song since my childhood and love singing it. In Bamako I met Zacharia who plays the Oud andhe Buzuk, instruments played in the Middle Eastern countries. His accompaniment has given this Bengali song a rich, oriental flavour.

Shukno patar nupur paye

This song is the product of a great nostalgia. I live in Bamako far away from India. My companion is French. My son speaks in French and English, though he does understand Bengali. I hardly ever get to speak in Bengali, my mother tongue. I sometimes feel I'm caught between cultures, civilisations, languages. And I think this song expresses my feeling of rootlesness and the loss of a strong cultural identity.

I don't have a language to sing in

This is a song after my heart. It expresses the way I am.  I don't earn my living either through writing or music. I'm not famous. But the very fact of writing, singing, gives me a keen sense of pleasure and fulfillment. And I'm  sure that there are many like me, who sing, write, paint, dance, because they love to do so and beacause  it gives meaning to their lives.

I'm an amateur artist

Chandi Shloka

Here’s one of the first Baul songs I learnt from Parvathy. It’s full of delightful paradoxes: I’ll go to the river, swim from one bank to another, but I’ll not get my locks wet. I’ll cook and feed others, but I’ll not touch the cooking pot. I ‘ll be neither a good wife, nor a bad one, but I’ll not leave my husband. I had very short hair at that time and was a terrible cook, so needless to say the song appealed to me. But jokes aside the spirit of the song is so Baul, to be in the world, partake in it’s pleasures and pain (not that we have a choice) without drowning in them,with lightheartedness.

Arunima Choudhury

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