Kalika Prasad Bhattacharya

Early life

Music was an intrinsic part of Bhattacharya’s home at Silchar, Assam. Growing up amidst rhythm & tune, learning to play the tabla happened as naturally as he learned to take his first faltering step. His fascination with the tabla gradually propelled him towards various ethnic percussion. While learning to play this, he also trained in vocal music. His keen interest in music eventually inclined him towards the folk music of Bengal and northeastern India. Thus, began his search for traditional folk songs which are vibrant, melodious and unanimous folk tunes that were always there unnoticed and unidentified. In 1995, he enrolled at Jadavpur University in the Comparative Literature department. In 1998, he got a research grant from "India foundation for the arts"^[4] for "Industrialisation and Folk music" and went to Bangalore.

Dohar

Bhattacharya in one of his folk concerts

Bhattacharya formed Dohar,^[5] a group of folk musicians, in 1999 to make the unnoticed folk songs flowing for time immemorial reach innumerable people under his creative direction. Dohar's presentation is uniquely original. Their performance amazingly merge the urban feelings with their commitment to the roots; research and entertainment, being inseparably entwined. Dohar has already released nine albums of folk songs directed by Kalika from Concord records, Sony music & Sa re ga ma (HMV). Dohar's fourth album – "Bangla" is a collection of Rabindra Sangeet and folk songs. The concept of the album is a dialogue between Rabindra Sangeet & folk music based on its thematic reading. Dohar was impaneled by Indian Council for cultural relations (ICCR).

Musical career

Bhattacharya sang few playback songs in Hindi and Bengali movies. His songs in Hindi film include Gumshuda, directed by Ashoke Viswanathan. In the year 2007, he sang for the Bengali film Chaturanga directed by Suman Mukhopadhyay. In the year 2008, he sang for the Bengali film Moner Manush (golden peacock award winner) which is an India-Bangladesh joint project directed by Goutam Ghose. It is a feature film based on the novel by Sunil Gangopadhyay on Fakir Lalan Shah's life & philosophy. Bengali film Jaatishwar was a national award (Rajat Kamal) winner movie directed by Srijit Mukherjee, where Bhattacharya sang in the year 2014. In 2012, Bhattacharya wrote various research oriented articles which were published in various national and international journal and news papers. He also did music for eminent theater groups like Nandikar, Kalyani Natya Charcha and Tritiyo Sutro.

Besides, Bhattacharya was the pivotal personality at a seminar on Dr. Hazarika during that program in Dhaka. Apart from playback in many popular Bengali & Hindi movies, he has given music direction in the films like "Selfie" directed by Sovan Tarafdar,^[6] "Bhuban Majhi" directed by Fakhrul Arefin (Bangladesh),^[7] "Bishorjan" directed by Koushik Ganguli,^[8] "Rosogolla" directed by Pavel and "Sitara" directed by Ashish Roy.

Devotion to Folk music

Bhattacharya was fully devoted towards the songs of soul and heart of rural Bengal. This is reiterated from his most recent occupation as one of the founder-organizers of "Sahaj Parav"^[9]- an annual root music festival, one of its kinds in India, looking to celebrate the diversity and variety of folk forms of arts and crafts in greater south Asia, with a deliberate focus on Bengal. Through this, Kalika's commitment to the proliferation of the traditional arts is explicit and once again confirms his pledge for the development and rediscovery of the lost tunes of the soil. Kalika was also can safely be attributed on as a Tagorian scholar. His "Ajab Kudrati‟, is also an unparalleled dramatic presentation relating an aspect of Lalan Fakir with Tagore. This proves his unique innovative idea at the dramatic craftsmanship as well.

The TV channel Zee Bangla established that Bhattacharya's genius should not only be limited to the Bengalis but should be expanded also to the people cutting across the language barrier just like Punjabi folk songs. He promoted Bengali folk music in the program Sa Re Ga Ma Pa,^[10] and got worldwide acclamation. Following the death of Bhupen Hazarika, Bangladesh government organized a memorable program as a token of tribute to the maestro where Bhattacharya led Dohar dished out unforgettable numbers of Dr. Hazarika.