Originality wrapped in nostalgia: Dolchhut's Music Day releases a pleasant surprise in otherwise dark times

‘World Music Day’ is an annual celebration of music observed on June 21 all around the globe. It is a day to encourage young and enthusiastic musicians to perform, where anyone can play their favourite instruments for enjoyment and relaxation. This year too was no exception, despite the fact that the entire world is still battling against the Covid-19 pandemic. In Silchar, the popular folk band ‘Dolchhut’, just like every year, has also celebrated the day, but in a more creative and indulging direction.

To mark the event of World Music Day, ‘Dolchhut’ has released three brand new songs on June 21 much to their fans’ delight. Right since the formation of the band in 2008, Dolchhut has been actively performing live as well as releasing materials consistently throughout the years. But this year, due to the prevailing pandemic restrictions, the band couldn’t celebrate the day like usual time. Rather, they decided to come up with new compositions on World Music Day to celebrate the event and also give a taste of their musicianship to celebrate this day dedicated to musicians all over the world.

The three songs that Dolchhut released on June 21 are ‘Mon Foring er Gaan’, ‘Akasher Tara-ra Chup-Chap, School Bela’r Gaan’ and ‘Andhar Raite’. The first two happens to be their original composition whereas the last one is a modern rendition of a popular folk song of the same name. Sayan Biswas of Dolchhut, who penned the two original compositions of the band, said that although the pandemic this year didn’t let them celebrate this auspicious day like every other year, it wasn’t enough to stop them from composing something for their listeners.

He said, “Dolchhut has been actively performing and releasing materials since 2008. And it was Dolchhut who introduced the ‘World Music Day’ to the people of Barak Valley more than a decade back, as it was mostly unheard of back in those days. Although it was mostly celebrated in European countries back then, now the entire world acknowledges and celebrates it, including Barak Valley. Especially after the Internet became accessible in this region to the common people around 2010-11, the concept of World Music Day became more popular here.”

Adding, “We have been celebrating this day every year through live shows, but as this year has been challenging to everyone, we decided to release something sitting at home so that we could keep in touch with our listeners and also mark this auspicious day for musicians.”

While talking about the inspiration behind these three compositions, Sayan Biswas said, “The three songs that we released on that day, 2 of them were original compositions, and the other one is a rearrangement of a popular Bangladeshi folk song. The song ‘School Bela’r Gaan’ talks about nostalgia surrounding school and the memorable moments that one gets to spend during those formative years.”

“For us in the band, school days have a special place in our hearts as so many memories and friendships were etched during that time. And I’m sure many of our listeners too would agree to that as this song talks about the nostalgic days of school. The song was written and composed by me, and was sung by Biswaraj Bhattacharjee and Supriya Bhattacharjee,” he added.

‘Mon Foring er Gaan’ is a folko-modern or one could say semi-folk composition. The band calls it ‘folko-modern’ because folk song culturally and historically has always been about stories from the rural villages. “But we at Dolchhut have never tasted the life of rural India, and all of us were brought up in suburban or urban areas including myself. If you pay attention to the lyrics of the song, you’d notice that the entire song is written in standard Bengali and not in the dialect or language of the usual folk composition. But all the instruments used in the composition were folk instruments mostly and the entire song has a heavy traditional folk influence to it”, said Sayan Biswas.

He also said that the songs feature a plethora of instruments like Violin, Mouth organ, Cajon, Dotara, different types of percussion instruments, etc. which makes the composition structurally rich and diverse.

All three releases have been accompanied by a music video and are available on YouTube. The songs ‘Andhar Raaite’ and ‘School Bela’r Gaan’ were mixed and mastered at the FX Audio and the music videos were produced by the Sonicspawn Studios of Silchar. ‘Mon Foring er Gaan’ was mixed & mastered by Devkamal Sinha while its music video was shot by Subrajit Paul.