Amar Nath

Pandit Amarnath (1909-1996) was the well-known disciple of Ustad Amir Khan, founder of the Indore gharana of Hindustani [Indian classical] music. He was his first and closest disciple, and continued the legacy by bringing into the gayaki or style, his own unique raga-meditations in over 150 ragas, a peak range, as far as raga repertoires of his generation go. While Amir Khan had specially propagated the vilambit or the slow style of singing, Amarnath further enriched the gharana with the mystic poetry he wrote as bandish for khayal singing, under the pen-name of Miturang.

Amar Nath was born in 1909 in Jhang in Punjab, now in Pakistan. He received his initial training in music from Professor B.N. Datta of Lahore, from 1942 to 1947, and moved to Delhi after the partition of India. It was his first guru, Prof. Datta, who suggested that he go to Khan for further learning. As Amarnath was already singing the ustad's style, and as public opinion was that the disciple sounded so much like his guru, Amir Khan was convinced about his sincerity, and accepted him as a disciple.

Besides devoutly following Amir Khan's style, teaching and demonstrating the style, Amar Nath also served at All India Radio for eight years, as Composer, recruited specially by Pandit Ravi Shankar during the latter's tenure at AIR. Pandit Amarnath later served as Director of Triveni Kala Sangam, and then as Guru at the Shriram Bharatiya Kala Kendra, in Delhi. This is where he evolved the futuristic, and unique Pandit Amarnath Teaching Method. He also provided music for the 1955 film Garam Coat starring Balraj Sahni and Nirupa Roy, in which Lata Mangeshkar sang the 5 songs out of which one song, Jogiya se preet kiye dukh hoye, became one of her all-time favourites. She featured this song in her life's 10 best-song collection brought out by HMV. Garam Coat was a story by Rajinder Singh Bedi Pandit Amarnath also directed the music for a documentary on Mirza Ghalib. This included the first and only ghazal recorded in the voice of Ustad Amir Khan; the documentary was made by M. S. Sathyu.

He died March 9, 1996.

The book, Conversations with Pandit Amarnath conducted by Bindu Chawla, based on conversations with him, was published by Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts, Delhi, in the year 2004. His memoire about his guru, Amir Khan, was published in 2008, by the Pandit Amarnath Memorial Foundation. The book is entitled Indore ke Masiha/Prophets of Indore, memoires of my guru, USTAD AMIR KHAN SAHEB. The Pandit Amarnath Vaggeyakar Samman, or Composer's Award, is instituted in his memory every year by the Pandit Amarnath Memorial Foundation, whose Chairperson is his daughter, Bindu Chawla.

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