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Rabindranath Tagore was a remarkable human being whom we could call a myriad-minded genius: a poet, dramatist, novelist, short story writer, musician and music composer, painter, philosopher, educationalist, essayist, environmentalist, social activist and an indomitable free spirit. "He has touched nothing that he has not adorned", in the words of Oxford University's degree citation at the end of his life in 1940.
Rabindranath was born in Calcutta on 7 May 1861. He grew up in the high noon of the British Empire, when British influence was at its zenith. The impact of English literature on Indians of that time was tremendous. That he was able under these conditions to virtually reinvent his mother tongue Bengali, is therefore of extraordinary interest.
His family environment was favourable for such an attempt. Not only were his brothers and sisters and their spouses abundantly gifted, his father and grandfather, in their highly contrasting ways, were exceptional men by the standard of any society.
Rabindranath made his first visit to England in 1878. He stayed there well over a year, returning to Bengal only in 1980, but didn't complete any course there. However, this visit powerfully influenced him and he took back with him a knowledge of English and Irish melodies current in 1980, which he quite soon put to use in both song compositions and dramas.
I may not be charged with heresy if I may say that all Indian ragas and raginis are keyed to the ideal of abstract universalism. No particular feeling or individual emotion has any place in them. In course of time, numerous new melodies were created from the first group of 42 melodies handed down to us by tradition. Throughout the centuries, gifted composers enriched Indian music with new creations, which, however, were all in the traditional pattern of abstract universalism. None of these melodies ever gave expression to the infinite and varied emotions of the fleeting moments of life, emotions which are genuine blossoms of the human heart, and tender and fragile as dewdrops.
Rabindranath Tagore introduced in Indian music a new note, which till then was completely unknown. His songs gave expression to the moods of the flowing moments of life. The abstract impersonal morning of the melody Bhairavi was now...