The Journey: Unfurling the Map by Moushumi Bhowmik
In the beginning it was just a personal journey, a random collection of songs from the road, with no particular purpose or method in mind. I was picking up music with which I could instinctively
connect, as a musician. There was no route map laid out before me, only repeated visits to music stores of Patuatuli in old Dhaka which sold folk music of Bengal, during my trips to Bangladesh for reasons other than music, between 1994 and ’97. Cassettes began to pile up on shelves at home in Kolkata, many of which remained wrapped in cellophane, gathering dust. But some I played over and over till their songs started to become part of my own repertoire. Then I wanted to know more; more than just the song.
OF THE RECORD: Sukanta Majumdar
It was a summer afternoon in 2003 or ’04, I can’t clearly recall, on our way back from Surul to Santiniketan, when Moushumi asked me if I would join her project on “biraher gaan” as a research assistant. I was still at film school, studying sound recording. She wanted me primarily as a resource person since I had grown up there, in Birbhum. I agreed and started to work most earnestly on my first assignment, which was to locate and establish contact with Kanai Das Baul (Kanai Baba) of Tarapith. With the help of a friend of my aunt’s I found him, and fixed a date for us to go and see him.
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