Harmonium players today, at times experience shabby treatment from the vocalists they are accompanying , as well as from the organisers of music concerts and conferences and even from the audience. Most musicians think that harmonium is only an accompanying instrument. Eyebrows get raised when one asks for an opportunity for solo performance . Tabla players, though they may be accompanists, are ranked higher as their contribution to the program is more visible. Also Tabla solo has been well established since hundreds of years.

The harmonium, being much younger, is still struggling to find its place. If this is the scene today imagine what it must have been a hundred years ago when the harmonium had just arrived with its “foreigner” tag still fresh.

Imagine the hardships faced by those few who fell in love with the robust sound of this wonderful instrument. Love is blind they say, so probably they did not realize the limitations of the harmonium. But there must have been no shortage of so called purists, who thought that this instrument is a total misfit in Indian classical music and were keen to throw it out of the mehfils as soon as possible. When you become aware of this scenario you realize the vision, perseverance and hard work put in by great stalwarts like Pandit Govindrao Tembe, Pandit Vitthalrao Korgaonkar and their contemporaries. They were on an uncharted path with no one to guide them, not fully aware of the limitations or the great potential of this wonderful instrument.

It is thanks to these great stalwarts that the harmonium players of today are soaring higher and higher, exploring previously unheard and unimagined possibilities.