I am not a trained musician in this format. I am also aware of that fact that this is no great piece of music what I have produced. But then why did I do this?

Well, there is a special story to it. A person, who I met on the street of Calcutta, made me do this.  I just wanted to see the raaga a bit closely as a musician, while writing about him. If one can read Bangla, may visit http://wp.me/p1sIGT-cw to read the story... 

I know, you will never see this post Janab Ekram Hussain, 
but still... I remember you.

Remembrance - Durga (Ektaal Drut)

Chromatic Harmonica, Chord Harmonica, Melodica, 
Music Arrangement, Sound Programming and Recording by 
Sumanta Basu.

Track info: Composed by Salil Chowdhury. Sung by Utpala Sen.

Prantorer Gaan :: Sumanta Basu on Harmonica

Oi malatilata dole piyal tarur kole :: Sumanta Basu on Harmonica

Sri Kabir Suman Composed this ‘kabiyal’ song written by the famous ‘kabiyal’ of the past Horu Thakur for the film ‘Jatismar (2013)’ by Srijit Mukherjee. This particular genre of ‘kabiyal’ songs was called 'Sokhi Sambad'. The famous Actor-Director Suman Mukherjee sung this ‘Keertan’ based composition in the film.

I loved almost all of the songs from the movie since I could hear them. Just after the film was released I tried to play the famous "E tumi kemon tumi" on the Harmonica (though I had created a new orchestration for it). I had thought of recording some more songs from the same film, not because Kabir won the prestigious National Award for his remarkable work as a Music Director for this movie; but his creations could touch my soul. After so many years someone composed some songs for a Bengali film, those were truly Bengali in essence. After so many years someone composed some songs for a Bengali film – those could bring tears in my eyes... just for sheer musical brilliance. 

These compositions had strong connections to my root, so I could identify myself well within these songs.

I have always had strong admiration for ‘Keertan’ since my childhood and always loved to play ‘Keertan’ based songs composed by Rabindranath and other composers on the Harmonica. This song, composed by Sri Kabir Suman can also be categorised under this great genre of Bengali music like many of his other great creations.  

In my humble effort, I tried to keep the original orchestration to the extent I could. I know it would have been great if I could use the ‘Khol’ as the percussion instrument. But I had no one who could play it for me. Except for the Chromatic harmonica, I played all of the other instruments on my own using my midi keyboard and recorded the entire piece of music at my home. I do not have any VSTi which sounds like the ‘Khol’, so I had to use ‘Tabla’ (from SwarPlug) instead. I tried to compose the rhythm as realistic as I could.

Hope I could create something worth listening.


Aage jodi sokhi janitem - Jatismar (2013) :: Sumanta Basu on Harmonica

This song was created long back based on a modern Bengali song written and composed by Sri Kabir Suman titled 'Onek din por' - from the Album 'Onek din por' by Kabir Suman and Anjan Dutta. 
Keeping the tune intact, I have tried to transcreate Suman's Lyrics into Hindi with whatever limited knowledge of Hindi I have.  

This is a scratch home recording - an experiment by Avra and Myself. Apart from writing the Hindi lyrics, I tried to orchestrate the song using Cubase, and play the Harmonica, while Avra tried to sing the song with his Hindi with an underlined Bengali accent.

This was fun for us.

- Sumanta Basu - August 1 2018

Bohot Din Baad :: by  Avra Ghosh

Shono kono ek din :: Sumanta Basu on Harmonica

Hridoye mondrilo domoru :: Sumanta Basu on Harmonica

Harmonica: Sumanta Basu
Composition: Salil Chowdhury
Original Artist: Lata Mangeshkar

Sumanta Basu

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