Reviews

The unique feature of her Sufi repertoire is that she sang two ghazals of Kabir which have been sung in the form of Folk or Bhajan but never before as Ghazal. It is interesting to note that although the language in the two Kabir ghazals are not written in chaste Urdu (Urdu was in its nascent stage and in the process of developing in the 15th century) the literary format meets the technical requirements of Ghazal. It is also interesting to note that Ghazal’s popularity had reached such heights by the 18th century that it inspired mystic-poets like Tulsi Sahib Hathrasi to spread his message through the literary form of Ghazal. She sang two ghazals by this lesser known mystic-poet. To show that three centuries apart, Amir Khusro (Sufi movement ) and Mirabai (Bhakti movement) used some similar metaphors, she melded their poetry into one song.