Dhrupad

Dhruvatara - the evening star, the star that never trembles, and Pada - poetry, merge to give name to this music, Dhrupad. Dhrupad, the name does what it should, it makes luminous the nature of that which is named.

This is a music which depends very little on virtuosity. Here, whatever becomes music is what has been contemplated upon. The musician is alone with nothing but the vastness of the self as anchor, the very musicality lying in the contemplation.
There is little here that can impress, that has a narrative, events or arrival. What there is instead is a movement, born out of the musical search that takes the self from wherever it is standing to a new, unknown place.

"When I close my eyes and begin to sing, there is only darkness... slowly, light comes, then the beginnings of colour."Ustad Zia Fariduddin Dagar

An introduction to a Dhrupad Performance by Ustad Zia Fariduddin Dagar: