Close during a performance. Photo Credit: Puneet Patel
The music of the Char Yaar Encynable shows that the difference is not a big deal. This is not only the religious identity of the band members who often find mention. Nor do they sing with the beetles combining Kabir, or Bartolt Brecht with Bulle Shah. Four musicians carelessly take a dip in many music styles, making a melange of songs that are pleasant as thoughts.
The song presented at the Sacred Spirit Festival in Jodhpur was born in various socio-political and cultural contexts. He made him aware of infallible and mysticism. Anand images or “drug dances”; Jumping soil on a potter’s wheel; A world in which “there is nothing to kill or die, and there is no religion” Hawa filled the wind when Madan Gopal Singh, Deepak Castilino, Pritam Ghosal and Amjad Khan performed in Chokhelo Bagh (once a fruit garden in the huge complex of the Mehrangar Fort). His set-list merged literature, poetry, philosophy, music and theater, with no heaviness.
The origin of Char Yaar begins in friendship, deep association with social justice values, Sufi poetry and turbulent politics. Safdar’s brother Sohail met Safdar’s brother Sohail Hashmi from Madan Gopal and late Safdar Safdar Hashmi (Founder of Street-Theater Group Jana Nataya Manch). Both teachers of English literature, Safdar and Madan Gopal saw politically accused plays and faced a difficult time of emergency together. Later, it was Safdar Hashmi, who ordered Madan Gopal to listen to Casits that Sohail brought from Pakistan.
Madan Gopal was so carried out so much from the voices of Tafael Niazami and Alan Fakir that he had to take several breaks while hearing him. Madan Gopal says, “He shaped my musical journey. Tafael and more, due to language intimacy,”. As soon as he heard music, Safdar Hashmi dropped him with a cup of tea and cooked him. Madan Gopal recalls, “Safdar saw that I was emotionally distraught. He packed the cassette and handed them over to me.” He was played on the loop in Madan Gopal’s house for months, his family shared passion to listen to music and immersive.
Four friends want its music to be both pleasant and thoughtful
Madan Gopal says, “I started singing Heer Ranji because I had heard Tuffel Niazami and it was only due to Safdar Hashmi.” Later, “the universe plotted” to get her to sing with Tafael Niazi, Allen Fakir and Iranian Sufi singer Shahram Nazeri (whose voice he fell in love). Earlier, during the rise of extremism in Punjab, his platform came in the road-theater as a source for Safdar Hashmi plays. He later sang in the theater, art films and social ceremonies in Delhi’s homes (with his painter-Mitra Manjeet Bawa, on hand drums or dholak). In such a gathering, Madan Gopal met the guitarist and Jazz composer Deepak Castilino.
Music cooperation began three decades ago was inspired to form the four yar, in which Pritam Ghosal joined Sarod after a decade, and Amjad Khan included him in Tabla and later in Tabla. Deepak says that he “used with different sounds, tried the flute and sargi before narrowing these four”. He says that he mostly plays his compositions and translations by Madan Gopal. He offers workshops to children in rural Orissa and Kashmir in the early years.
As a band, his music is not only associated with entertainment, but also opposed to march and peace-making initiative. Each of them performs an independent music practice in addition to its work with the band.
Pritam Ghosal said that the conversation and a sound friendship plays an important role in its music-building. “We do not practice as much as we celebrate. When you are not over-thinking, your mind is free and what happens is comfortable.” Amjad Khan, whose tabla rendering has put his music together, says he feels very close to the band’s ethos, although he was the last to join him.
Published – March 26, 2025 01:45 pm IST
