Incredulous though it sounds, only a small fraction of the recorded music of
India's great masters of yesteryear has been published commercially. A large
body of mehfil recordings lies outside of public view, in the hands of private
collectors, unavailable to the common rasika. These national treasures
ought not to be any collector's fief. Even in the happy instance where a collector
is willing to part with his holdings there obtains the familiar logjam: copyright and
related legalese are a fact of contemporary life. It is, therefore, unlikely that
these treasures will see the light of day anytime soon.
On this page Sawf will bring to you, intermittently, snapshots (alas!) of old
recordings, most of them unpublished and hard-to-find. Several of these recordings are documents of live performances and therefore may not have the kind of audio clarity obtained in a studio setting. It is hoped that you will look beyond the uneven, fractured sound and the hiss. If you don't, it is your loss.
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