Dr Mousumi Banerjee, a renowned Tagore artist and poet, along with performing artiste and sarod player Dr Rajeeb Chakraborty and Debjit Patitundi, an Indian Tabla player will be performing today at the Bangladesh National Museum from 4pm to 6pm, bringing forth an evening of soulful performances of poetry and songs.
The two hour long programme will feature an interesting set of performances, with Banerjee and Chakraborty performing a unique jugalbandi between poetry recitations and the sarod. “It’s marrying two disciplines together. Poetry, on one end, has its own language to convey a message while music has its own individual style and interpretation. While she recites from some of her own compositions, I will be reciting via my sarod,” Chakraborty explained. The duo have created a new audience for their performance, seamlessly intertwining Indian classical music with other subtle forms of art, such as poetry.
“We’ve tried this form three to four times before, but coming to this level took a lot of research and development. However, by the end of it I was well acquainted with her poetry and her way of writing and I realised that we really could do something different. She’s a very, very sensitive poet and the subject she touches, the nuances in her style, I feel I can comfortably grasp and portray through my sarod.”
Dr Mousumi Banerjee is also a distinguished Professor of Biostatistics at the University of Michigan School of Public Health and Cancer Center at UM. She is visiting Bangladesh to explore potential public health research collaborations with the Foundation for Charitable Activities in Bangladesh in their clinic in Bagdumur village, Sirajganj.
“I really love the warmth of the people here. My father lived in Bangladesh during his younger years and I feel like I know this country from his eyes,” Bannerjee said, during an interview held yesterday.
Professionally, Mousumi lives in a world of hard science, trying to make sense of data to move cancer research and treatment forward but Rabindranath lives in her heart - among quiet trees that bend over blue waters, amidst the smell of hasnahena on a summer night, the touch of August rains caressing her face, and the sound of silence in a wooded path faraway from home. For Mousumi, Rabindranath’s songs and poetry give expression to her emotions everyday, her deepest joys and sorrows, her love and separation, her prayers and her gratitude. Rabindranath’s oeuvre has indeed become her way of life.
When asked about how she finds time to manage both her demanding career and her love for the arts, she says: “The conventional wisdom regarding the arts and science not gelling well is odd. I don’t think one should compartmentalise the arts and the science. It’s not like when the left brain works, I switch off my right brain. I think they are in perfect harmony and I believe if you have the talent and passion to pursue any art form, you can. I don’t think there is any conflict but rather, it’s more like a collaboration.”
Today’s performance will not only include poetry, but will also feature songs. The event is set to showcase a unique aspect of Indian classical music as it takes on a highly subtle form of experimental art, decoding and interpreting the mood of music itself.
Mousumi has released two CDs, Hriday Amar Prakash Holo and Nijer Rabindranath and has one published book on poetry. She is also the executive director of a non-profit foundation Tagore Beyond Boundaries whose aim is to propagate Tagore’s music to the global audience by creating western classical transcriptions of Rabindra Sangeet that can be adopted by the world music fraternity.