This musical acquaintance gradually matured into personal friendship, almost to a point when we could be on abusing terms! By then I had taken to writing on Hindustani music as a freelance writer and concert reviewer in 1954 in The Times of India and its sister publications. I cannot remember the number of occasions we may have met on and off the concert auditorium.
Indeed, in retrospect, we find that few contemporary Hindustani vocalists have enjoyed such tremendous popularity and for so long as Bhimsenji. One can even say that few can equal his box-office appeal, his phenomenal professional career at home as well as abroad has more than fulfilled the hopes and expectations raised by him in the early '40s.
At the same time, in the course of his incredible climb to greater and still greater heights, Bhimsenji's approach to Khayal music has undergone many significant changes, which have evoked diverse reactions from his audiences. I am inclined to view the changes in his vocalism against the background of the qualitative changes witnessed on the wider musical scene after the attainment of political freedom.
This is equally true of the widening singing repertoire strictly outside the Hindustani traditional fare -- like his Sant Vani in Marathi, Kannada, Hindi; the Marathi stage hits; his playback singing, and his scoring music for Marathi stage presentations.
Bhimsenji's great musical moments are truly great. Indeed, at such moments he reveals a rare genius -- when the spirit seizes him in his creative ecstasy. Behind the powerful voice, amazing breath control, fine musical sensibility and an unwavering grasp of the fundamentals lies something that can only be termed sui generis.
Image: Additional Home Secretary A E Ahmed, second from left, presents the Bharat Ratna to Pandit Bhimsen Joshi in Pune, February 10. Photograph: Press Information Bureau.
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