- Jagjit Singh is credited with popularising ghazals and bringing them to the middle-class.
- He practiced during his college days, his hostelmates would ask him to stop.
- He was confident of his talent even then.
On Wednesday, the venerable ghazal master Jagjit Singh will turn 82 years old. He has a sizable fan base and is credited with popularizing ghazals and introducing them to the middle class. However, during his college years, his roommates would encourage him to quit practicing, but he was still confident in his abilities at the time.
Even in his undergraduate years, Jagjit Singh was convinced that his music would propel him to great heights. He has loved and worshipped music since he was a young child. When they lived together while attending DAV College in Jalandhar, vocalist Surendra Mohan Pathak recalls how the singer would rehearse music in the early hours, upsetting other dormmates.
In the biography Baat Niklegi Toh Phir: The Life and Music of Jagjit Singh by author Sathya Saran, Surendra remembers being Jagjit’s roommate and classmate as they both pursued BSc degrees at DAV College. He continues by saying that pupils with the lowest marks were given the last option when it came to choosing a room, and one such option was to stay in a room next to Jagjit Singh’s. This was due to Jagjit Singh’s daily two-hour riyaz practice sessions for singing, which began at five in the morning.
Surendra is also quoted in the book as adding, “Every evening at five, the riyaz session would be repeated for two hours. The boarders who lived next to Jagjit Singh’s room felt that they were being persecuted because of the constant “ruckus.” He would grab hold of any other boarder in the hallway and sing a catchy movie tune for him on other times as well. The listener, who was typically anything but appreciative, would shrug him off and say, “Friend, you won’t clear the papers, but let us study,” in addition to shaking him off. “Saalon, you will not listen to me now, but there will come a day when you’ll pay for this luxury,” Jagjit Singh would retort passionately in response.
In the book, Surendra also relates how, “at the audience’s request, and there never was a dry eye left,” Jagjit Singh would sing the same song every year during Lohri celebrations. Even after the song had ended, a lot of the youngsters would continue to cry in public. “Ay taa jag diyaan lohriyaa, saadhi ka di lohri akkhaan” was the song. Although Jagjit Singh is most renowned for singing ghazals, his extensive catalog also features bhajans, tappe, and other popular Punjabi songs.
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