Shivanand Swami Sangeet Pratishthan

Shivanand Swami Sangeet Pratishtan Website: www.GajananBuwaJoshi.com

Our Heritage of Hindustani Classical Music.

My father the late Pandit Gajananbuwa Joshi founded the Shivanand Pratishtan in Dombivali, near Mumbai In the year 1981. Shivanand Pratishtan is a charitable trust. The establishment of the Shivanand Pratishtan was the formalisation of the informal music festival that has been taking place since 1939 in Aundh the old princely state in Satara District, Maharashtra State.

Pandit Gajananbuwa was a unique and a versatile musician. He was probably the greatest violin player of Hindustani Classical Music and a great vocalist of three different Gharanas of North Indian Art Music namely - Gwalior, Agra and Jaipur. He was rightly considered to be a musician of the musicians!

Pandit Gajananbuwa’s father the great Pandit Antubuwa Joshi started the Aundh Music Festival to celebrate the Birth Anniversary of his spiritual Guru Swami Shivanand. Aundh Music Festival is perhaps the oldest such festival in India that has been going on continuously for over 70 years!

What started as an informal gathering of musicians who were family, friends, fans and disciples of Antubuwa and Gajananbuwa and were invited to present their music has now grown into a relatively large institution. In his older days my father Pandit Gajananbuwa was finding it difficult to manage the organisation and administration of the Aundh Festival. I therefore suggested that the affairs of the Aundh Festival should be formalised by establishing a charitable trust. This is how the Shivanand Swami Sangeet Pratishtan was born some thirty years ago with the help of Gajananbuwa’s disciples, fans and other musicians.

The central objective of the Shivanand Pratishtan has been to spread the beauty, power and knowledge of our heritage of the Classical Music. This objective is being achieved
Inviting the great musicians to present their music in Aundh as well as in Dombivali.

The list below of some of the musicians who performed at Aundh Festival reads like a page in a ‘who’s who ‘encyclopaedia of Music!

Bharat_Ratna Pandit Bhimsen Joshi, Pandita Gangubai Hangal, Pandit Jitendra Abhisheki, Pandit Babanrao Haldankar, Pandit Ram Marathe, Pandit C R Vyas, Vidushi
Malini Rajurkar, Pandit D K Datar, Ustad Nizamuddin Khansaheb, Ustad Shahid Parvez, Pandit Dinkar Kaikini, Pandit Balasaheb Poochwale, Pandit Vasantrao Deshpande, Pandit
Chhota Gandharva, Ustad Thirakhaw Khan Saheb, Ustad Shamsuddin Khan Saheb, Pandita Girija Devi, Shrimati Shama Bhate, Pandita Rohini Bhate, Shrimati Manjiri
Asanare, Pandita Jayshree Patnekar, Pandita Manik Varma, Pandit Bhai Gaytonde, Vidushi Padmavati Gokhale, Padmashree Ulhas Kashalkar, Pandit Arun Kashalkar, Pandit
Vikas Kashalkar, Pandit Madhubuwa Joshi, Shreemati Apoorva Gokhale, Shreemati Pallavi Joshi, Pandit Kagalkar Buwa, Pandit K G Ginde, Pandit Jasraj, Pandit Firoz Dastur,
Pandita Padma Talwalkar, Pandita Veena Sahasrabuddhe, Taalyogi Pandit Suresh Talwalkar, Pandita Sucheta Bidkar, and Pandit Gajananbuwa and his father Pandit
Antubuwa Joshi

Organising educational seminars for learners and students of music as well as musicians

Promoting publication of books relating to music and publishing an annual magazine.Exposing to young and upcoming musicians the life and work of some of the great
musicians of the past. Gajananbuwa was a lifelong devotee of Music as a performer, as an eternal learner and above all as a Guru. In his role as a Guru he generously taught his disciples and in some cases freely gave away whatever knowledge a disciple was able to take in. Here was a Guru whose door was open for a deserving and hard working student to learn and study the Gayaki of three different Gharanas and very many compositions in many Ragas if he was able and willing to learn!

Over the years we have been recording Gajananbuwa’s vocal and violin performances. We also have the original recordings of Gajananbuwa’s face to face tutions that he gave to his principle disciple Pandit Padmashree Ulhas Kashalkar and also few other disciples.

Thanks to the modern technology Shivanand Pratishtan has now launched Pandit Gajananbuwa’s website. The priceless treasure of the recordings of Buwa’s tuitions and his live
vocal and violin performances are now on this website and also on the Internet for listeners, students and indeed musicologists all over the world. Please see the link ‘Buwa’s Music on the WEB’ on this website.

As far as we know this is a unique set of tutions of about fifty or so Ragas. This set is a collection of live master classes on a one to one basis. This is ‘music in the making’ for the benefit of any learner, student, academician, researcher or a historian and it is available free on the Internet!

Shivanand Pratishtan has given without any charge the CDs containing the tuition series of Gajananbuwa to his disciples and also some educational institutions such as Pune University, Mumbai University and few others. Our aim is to give free of charge these CDs to many more music departments of the Universities, colleges and schools of music in India. We are also hoping to distribute the CDs abroad.

In addition to Buwa’s own musical output we are anxious to upload on Buwa’s website many recordings of many great musicians who participated in the Aundh Music Festival. We also have access to recordings of some of the great musicians who Gajananbuwa admired. Musicians like Bal Gandharva, Master Krishnarao, Ustad Faiyaz khan saheb, Surshree Kesarbai, Ustad Vilayat Hussain Khan Saheb and few others. In addition to making available the music of these great masters on Buwa’s website we intend to celebrate their music by organising live music events in Dombivali and Aundh. Celebrating the birth anniversaries of some of the leading lights of our art music is also our intention.

In short we wish to preserve a part of our great, large and rich heritage of the Hindustani classical music - the heritage that is stored in the recordings, the heritage that will educate, train and inspire the current and future generations of musicians, and the heritage that will delight music lovers all over the world.

I know that with the help of individuals and the commercial organizations Shivanand Pratishtan will continue to fulfill its objective. The objective to extend and broaden the invaluable work done by Antubuwa and Gajananbuwa:

To spread the beauty, power and knowledge of at least part our rich musical heritage.

We need your help. Please help.

We can do this only if we have sufficient funds. We need your generous help. Please give as much money as you can:

By becoming a Patron of our Trust by paying us a sum of Rs. 10,000/- or a Life Member by paying Rs. 2000/-. By virtue of your becoming our Patron / Life Member, you will be entitled to attend all the programmes organised by the Trust.

Please send donations by check in favor of "Shivanand Swami Sangeet Pratishthan"

Postal address: Durga Prasad, Kalyan Road, Dombivli (E) - 421 201, Maharashtra, India

With many thanks and Regards

Yours sincerely,
Manohar Gajanan Joshi
President
Shivanand Sangeet Pratishtan
Durga Prasad, 1st floor, Kalyan Road, Dombivli ( E) 421 201
Telephone No. 0251 – 2452866

"The Right Honourable Member of the Central Parliament and the Minister of Agriculture Shri Sharad Pawar donated a sum of Rs.2500000 through the Pawar Public Charitable Trust to Shivanand Swami Sangeet Pratishtan in the year 2010."

Bacchubhai who is the current (2011+) president of Shivanand Swami Sangeet Pratishtan expressed his heart felt gratitude to Shri Sharad pawar for his generous donation to Shivaand Swami Pratishtan in a speech in Aundh at the Sangeet Utsav. He also expressed his grateful thanks to Pandit Ulhas Kashalakar for his efforts to contact and persuade Shri Sharad Pawar to give a donation to the Shivanand Swami Sangeet Pratishtan.

- Dattaji and Bacchubhai.