Morning Meditation

Sumeet Anand Pandey is a tenth generation singer of dhrupad, India’s ancient song form that began as devotional music in the temples and during the 15th century became codified as art music in the Mughal courts. Pandey, a relatively young exponent, performs two morning ragas, ‘Raga Ahir Bhairav’ and ‘Raga Bhairav’. Both can often be heard in other vocal and instrumental formats but they seem particularly suited to dhrupad given the solemn, devotional and meditative nature of the song style where the lyrics are mainly in praise of god. Pandey, who also studied science and management, and is a curator of festivals and other events, has a fluid, mature and confident voice, which seems to glide along with an ease that makes the music sound beautifully and deceptively simple.

Devoid of ornamentation, this oldest documented vocal genre in the world has not only survived the test of time and reached us more or less intact, but it also goes on to attract newer generations of fans. Even so, there are relatively few exponents of this genre which makes huge demands on its performers, so releases are not that frequent and a new album is always a welcome addition to the collections of dhrupad enthusiasts and fans.