By IANS,
New Delhi : The great Hindustani classical singer Gangubhai Hangal, who has died at age 97, was a stickler for tradition and had little time for the current fad of light religious music.
Some years ago, giving an outdoor morning performance at Nehru Park in New Delhi’s Chanakyapuri area, she rebuffed an organiser of the concert when he asked her to sing a few “bhajans” – north Indian Hindu hymns.
“Ham bhajan-wajan nahin gaatey. Ham raag gaatey hain (I don’t sing bhajans, I sing classical ragas),” Hangal said loudly over the mike.
But the doyenne of the Kirana school of music did not disappoint her audience who had turned out in large numbers for the rare concert, for she went on sing a beautiful and extended melody in a morning raga.