The Sound of Music

Two parts, two musicians

The lesson has two separate parts about two different musicians. Part I is titled "Evelyn Glennie Listens to Sound without Hearing It" and Part II is "The Shehnai of Bismillah Khan". Both celebrate people who gave their whole lives to music.

Evelyn Glennie — the journey begins

The story opens at a London railway station. A nervous seventeen-year-old, Evelyn Glennie, is on her way to the Royal Academy of Music. Her nervousness is special: she has been profoundly deaf since the age of eleven. Her deafness was gradual. By the age of eight her hearing was already affected, and by eleven her marks had dropped and her parents finally took her to a specialist. It was discovered that her hearing was severely damaged by nerve damage, and she was advised to wear hearing aids and join a school for the deaf.

Refusing to give up

Evelyn was determined not to let deafness limit her life. She loved music and would not give it up. Her potential was first noticed by percussionist Ron Forbes. He realised that Evelyn could sense musical vibrations through her body rather than hearing them with her ears. He began by tuning two large drums to different notes and asked her not to listen through her ears but to feel the vibrations. Slowly Evelyn discovered that she could sense some notes in her wrists, some in her cheekbones, her skin, her scalp, and lower down in her body. As she herself said, she learned to open her mind and body to sounds and vibrations. From that moment she never looked back.

How Evelyn "hears"

Evelyn hears music by feeling its vibrations through her body. She often performs barefoot so that she can feel the music travel up through the floor and into her feet and legs. A single piece of music can pour through her in many ways: a drum beat may feel like a pulse on her skin, the sound of a xylophone may tingle in her fingertips. This way she experiences music more completely than many people who simply hear it.

The rise to fame

Evelyn was accepted by the Royal Academy of Music and scored one of its highest marks. She then conquered the music world, mastering some a thousand instruments. She gives more than a hundred concerts a year, performs solo, and also gives free concerts in prisons and hospitals. Her example is a beacon of inspiration to deaf children and to all people who face difficulties. As one journalist put it, she has given "new meaning to the word percussion".

Part II: The shehnai of Bismillah Khan

The second part traces the story of an instrument and the man who made it famous. Long ago, musicians had a wind instrument called the pungi, but the emperor Aurangzeb banned the pungi because its sound was shrill and unpleasant. A barber from a family of professional musicians improved the pungi: he chose a pipe with a natural hollow stem, made it longer and broader, and made seven holes in it. When he played, the sound was soft and melodious. Because it was first played in the royal chambers (the Shah) by a barber (Nai), the new instrument came to be known as the shehnai.

Sound of auspicious occasions

The shehnai became part of the naubat, or traditional ensemble of nine instruments, and was played in temples and at weddings. For a long time it was confined to these settings. It was Bismillah Khan who brought the shehnai onto the classical stage as a respected solo instrument.

Bismillah Khan's early life and training

Bismillah Khan was born on 21 March 1916 in Dumraon, Bihar, into a family of musicians. As a young boy he would accompany his uncle, the late Ali Bux, to the Vishnu temple of Varanasi (Benares), where Ali Bux was employed to play the shehnai. Bismillah practised there regularly. He found inspiration in the flowing waters of the river Ganga. He would even compose new ragas that had never been heard before, sitting on the banks of the river.

Fame and the nation's voice

At the age of fourteen Bismillah accompanied his uncle to the Allahabad Music Conference. His big break came with the opening of the All India Radio in Lucknow in 1938, which made his name a household word. When India became free on 15 August 1947, Bismillah Khan became the first Indian to greet the nation with his shehnai, pouring music into the air from the Red Fort. He played in Delhi's Red Fort on the eve of India's first Independence Day, and he has played there every Independence Day since, after the Prime Minister's address.

Awards and love for his homeland

Bismillah Khan won many honours: the Padma Shri, Padma Bhushan, Padma Vibhushan, and finally India's highest civilian award, the Bharat Ratna, in 2001. He played in films and travelled the world. Yet he was deeply attached to his city. Once a student in the USA offered to recreate Benares there if he would settle abroad; Bismillah refused, asking, "But where will you get the Ganga?" He loved both Benares and Dumraon and would never leave India. Through him, both the shehnai and India became famous around the world. Shehnai maestro Bismillah Khan remains an example of the rich, secular, cultural heritage of India.