City - Kolkata State - WEST BENGAL Country - India
About
Bauls are a group of mystic minstrels from Bengal, which comprises Bangladesh and the Indian state of West Bengal. Bauls constitute both a syncretic religious sect and a musical tradition used as a vehicle to express Baul thought. Bauls are a very heterogeneous group, with many different streams to the sect. They can be often identified by their distinctive clothes and musical instruments, like the ektara. Though Bauls comprise only a small fraction of the Bengali population, their influence on the culture of Bengal is considerable. In 2005, the Baul tradition was included in the list of Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO.
The origin of the word is Baul is debated. It has been suggested that it comes either from Sanskrit batul, meaning divinely inspired insanity or byakul, meaning fervently eager.
Baul music celebrates celestial love, but does this in very earthy terms, as in declarations of love by the Baul for his boshTomi or lifemate. With such a liberal interpretation of love, it is only natural that Baul devotional music transcends religion and some of the most famous baul composers, such as Lalon Fakir, have been of muslim faith. The famous Bengali poet Rabindranath Tagore was greatly influenced and inspired by Bauls.
Their religion is based on an expression of the body, which they call deho-shadhona and an expression of the mind, which they call mana-shadhona. Some of their rituals are kept mostly hidden from the mainstream, as they are thought[citation needed] to be repulsive by many, and hedonistic by others. They concentrate much of their mystic energies on the chaar-chand (bengali for four-moons), i.e. the four body fluids, on the nine-doors or naba-dwar, i.e. the openings of the body, prakriti which implies both the woman and the nature, and a control of breathing, known as domo-shadhona.
The music of the Bauls, bAul saMgeet, refers to a particular type of folk song of sung by Bauls. It carries influences of Hindu bhakti movements as well as the shuphi, a form of Sufi song mediated by many thousand miles of cultural intermixing, exemplified by the songs of Kabir, for instance. Their music represents a long heritage of preaching mysticism through songs in Bengal, like Shahebdhoni or Bolahadi sects.
Bauls use a number of musical instruments to embellish their compositions. The "ektara" is a one-stringed drone instrument, and by far the most common instrument used by a Baul singer. It is the carved from the epicarp of a gourd, and made of bamboo and goatskin. Other commonly used musical instruments include the dotara, a multi-stringed instrument made of the wood; the dugi, a small hand-held earthen drum; percussion instruments like dhol and khol; small cymbals called "kartal" and "mandira" and the bamboo flute.
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