This Map will help you navigate Ajab Shahar
- ‘a wondrous city’ of poems, songs and conversations around Kabir and other Bhakti, Sufi and Baul poets from in and around India. Wandering through this city you will hear many voices - from Pakistan in the west to Bengal in
the east - giving you a taste of the oral traditions that have kept this poetry alive through song for hundreds of years.
The city has 3 main gateways - Songs, Couplets and Words. But you could also wander through other pathways, such as Reflections, People, Classroom, Films, Stories, Radio, Participate, Shop or Resources
In the coming years we will populate this city with hundreds of recordings drawn from the Kabir Project journeys. Your contribution to any of these spaces is most welcome! Write to us at [email protected]
Ajab Shahar houses live recordings of songs from the oral traditions. In celebration of this rich tradition we have chosen not to feature purely printed sources of poetry.
Along with the video or audio recording of a Song, you may find other Versions sung by singers from other genres and regions. The text of the song is featured as a Poem in its original language, transliteration and translation/s along with Meanings for specific words. In Related you may find Reflections on the song and a random sample of other materials that share a key word/idea with the song.
Most songs featured here are bhajans of Kabir and other Bhakti poets such as Gorakhnath, Meera, Ravidas, Dharamdas, Rohal Fakir, Bananath, Brahmanand and others, sung in folk music traditions of Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Kutch, Gujarat and some classical versions. There are also qawwalis, waais and Sufi folk songs which feature poets such as Shah Abdul Latif Bhitai, Sachal Sarmast, Amir Khusro, Bulleshah and others. Baul songs from the east of India bring us the voices of Lalon Fakir, Madan Shah Fakir, Roshik and other Bengali poets.
A Kabir doha or couplet has sometimes been called gaagar mein saagar, or ‘ocean in a pot’. The poem is small, but its import encompasses the whole world. Here you can read short poems drawn from the oral traditions of Bhakti and Sufi poetry. Variously termed in different cultural contexts as dohas, saakhis, rekhtas, shers or beyts, they are are typically sung before a song or woven into the body of the song, as in a qawwali.
You can read the couplet in its original language, transliteration or translation/s or Listen to it sung in one or several audio recordings. In Related you may find Reflections on the couplet and a random sample of other materials that share a key word/idea with the couplet.
'Word' is a significant idea or term found in mystic poems, such as, shoonya (emptiness) or gagan-mandal (sky-dome). These recurring motifs are often dense symbols containing multiple resonances and layered meanings. 'Words' also feature themes in the poetry such as Death or poetic genres such as Ulatbaansi.
For each ‘Word’ we offer a simply written Introduction signalling its vast universe of meanings, along with Reflections by diverse speakers and authors. In Related,
you can view all Songs and Couplets
tagged by the word.
'Reflections' are conversations with or writings by various people that open up key ideas and create a powerful immersion in this poetry and its wisdom.
Very much in the spirit of Kabir and other mystic poets, we believe that knowledge resides in lived experience and not in intellectual abstractions and theories. Speakers and writers featured in Ajab Shahar include the folk singers themselves, thinkers and practitioners from villages deeply immersed in this poetry, academic scholars, folklorists, philosophers and urban social and cultural activists.
This section features a motley crew of diverse characters – from the poets whose songs are featured in the site, to contemporary singers, scholars, writers, poets, painters, filmmakers, artists, teachers and others who have been inspired by this poetry and share wisdom from their own lives, art and practice.
Here you also find legendary poetic figures evoked in the poems. So, Sohini Mahiwal and Sasui Punhoon will rub shoulders with Kashi Ba, a fruit seller we met in Dewas or Ashok Vajpeyi, a contemporary poet based in Delhi.
You can read a short profile of each person and Explore their Songs, Reflections and other works here. Contact details are provided so that singers especially may be contacted directly for concerts and collaborations.
This section features materials from workshops and classroom experiments of teachers and educators who have taken the spirit of mystic poetry into classrooms in innovative ways. We share Ideas, Reflections, Resources, Scripts and other materials to spark possibilities in the practice of other teachers.
This section features films inquiring into mystic poetry and music. Here you can view 4 musical documentary films on Kabir directed by Shabnam Virmani, the making of which in a sense started the journeys of the Kabir Project. You can also watch other films capturing the spirit of the Rajasthan Kabir Yatra 2012, and of a live performance tour by singer Prahlad Tipanya in USA in 2003.
The 4 Kabir films can be viewed in full length or as smaller Episodes. In Related you will find interviews and reviews, and also the full-length Songs and Reflections (interviews) that were later edited into these films.
A curated gallery of creative expressions in response to the experience of mystic poetry, such as paintings, illustrations, animations, short stories, photo essays, multi-media narratives and more.
Listen to a curated and randomised sampling of some of the best song recordings from Ajab Shahar, spanning a rich diversity of singers, poets, regions, genres and languages.
This space thrives on your contributions – the Ajab Shahar community! We hope to see this place come alive with your songs, poems, artworks, translations, echoes and reflections.
Browse and shop from a catalogue of films, music CDs, books, T-shirts and other materials pertaining to mystic poetry and music, created by the Kabir Project. 50% of profits from the sale of music CDs is shared with artists, and the rest goes into upkeep and expansion of Ajab Shahar.
This is a suggested list of resources put together by the Ajab team to help users deepen their inquiry into mystic poetry and its oral traditions, including books, films, web links, singers, local resource people and organizations. By no means an authoritative or exhaustive listing, this is merely a list of resources we have encountered and found useful.