Govindrao Tembe (Govind Sadashiv Tembe, 1881- 1955)

Although there is a mention of sporadic harmonium solos before his time, Govindrao is rightly given the credit for placing the harmonium firmly on the centre stage, as a solo instrument, for the first time. Born in Kolhapur on 5/6/1881, he was exposed to all the prominent musicians of those days , at the famous Deval Club. This gave him a firm grounding in the basics of Indian classical music . Although he developed his harmonium skills largely on his own , he got to learn the nuances of classical music from the great Bhaskarbua Bakhale. Also he considered Alladiyan Khansaheb as his Guru, though he didn’t directly learn from him. He also came in contact with Bhachubhai Bhandari,Laxmanrao (from Hyderabad) and Bhaiyya Ganpatrao of Gwalior . Govindrao was not only a harmonium player but also a music composer and an actor. He composed music for the musical play “Manapman” in 1910 and later for “Vidyaharan”.He blended pure classical music with Purab style semi classical music in his stage compositions . He also composed for the first Marathi takie movie “Ayodhyecha Raja” in 1932 and even acted in it He later composed , directed and staged Operas “Jayadev” and “Mahashveta “. Musical opera was a novel form of presentation in those days. He wrote his autobiography “ Maaza Sageet Vyasanga “as well as a book titled “Kalpana Sangeet”,explaining the structural beauty of a 100 selected ragas. He died in New Delhi on 9/10/1955

Vitthalrao Korgaonkar (1884-1974)

Though born in Mumbai , he spent his early years in Korgaon , where he was exposed to “Kirtan “ music . Later he moved back to Mumbai where he had the good fortune to learn from Bhachubhai Bhandare from 1899 to 1905.He then opened a shop in Hubli dealing with harmonium, cycles, stoves , HMV records etc Here he came into close contact with vocalists like Bal Gandharva, Vazebuva, Sawai Gandharva, Hirabai etc which enriched his music tremendously. He was fortunate to learn from Abdul Karim Khan from 1906 to 1927. He used to play classical khayals, thumri as well as natyasangeet. HMV company recorded 9 records of his solo performances which became quite popular. He was also an expert in harmonium tuning. Among his prominent disciples are Rambhau Vijapure and Purshottam Walawalkar. His recordings have been preserved in Gomantak Kala Academy in 1974

Dilip Chandra Vedi (1901-1992)

Born in Anandpur in Punjab he was a vocalist of Agra Gharana as well as an accomplished harmonium player . He learnt initially from Bhaskarbua Bakhale and from Faiyyaz Hussain Khan. He later learnt from Alladiya Khan also. He was a master in Dhrupad Dhamar, khayal and Thumri. He received many awards including fellowship of the Sangeet Natak Academy.

Bhishmadev Vedi (1910-1984)

Born in New Delhi in 1910, he was a versatile musician being proficient in classical vocal, harmonium, Tabla as well as Katthak Dance. He studied shruti shastra in depth and gave many Lec Dems vocally as well as on the harmonium. He introduced many novel features in the harmonium such as the placement of a harp like device on top for better resonance, Gandhar based tuning and a keyboard with atimandra saptak.

Jnan Prakash Ghosh (1912-1997)

Born in Kolkata on 8th May 1909 he was the grandson of Dwarkanath Ghosh (1847-1928) , the inventor of the “Dwarkin Harmonium”. He was a renowned harmonium and table player . He learnt Tabla from Masit Khan of Farukhabad Gharana and later also from Feroz Khan of Punjab Gharana. He learnt vocal music from Girija Shankar, Mohammed Sagir Khan and Mohammed Dabir Khan. He was a music producer for All India Radio for 15 years. He scored music for many Bengali films. He was closely associated with Sangeet Research Academy. He received the Sangeet Natak Akademi Fellowship in 1974 and Padma Bhushan in 1984. Among his students are prominent musicians like Kanai Dutta, Anindo Chatterjee, Nikhil Ghosh and Ajay Chakrabarty. He died on 18th February 1997.

Rambhau Bijapure (1917-2010)

Born in 1917 at Kagwad in Belgaum district , he learnt harmonium initially from Hannikeri Mallayya and later from Govindrao Gaikwad, Rajwade and Hammantrao Walvekar . He also took vocal lessons from Ramkrushnabua Vaze , Shivrambua Vazeand Kagalkarbua. His harmonium solo performances were marked by clear,smooth and unbroken flow of swaras. He used the bellows precisely to add expression to his presentation. He accompanied most stalwart vocalists of his time and he was particularly influenced by those of the Kirana Gharana. In 1938 he started the “ Shri Ram Sangeet Mahavidyalaya “. Dr Sudhanshu Kulkarni , Ravindra Mane and Dr Ravindra Katoti are among his prominent disciples. Among his many awards are the “Karnatak Kala Tilak”in 1985,” Nadashree Puraskar “in 1992 and “Sangatkar Puraskar “ by Gandharva Mahavidyalaya in 1999

Govindrao Patwardhan (1925-1996)

He was born in Guhagar on 21/9/1925. As a child he used to participate in musical programs in his village. Later he came to Mumbai for work and joined the Mumbai Police. He had no formal education in harmonium but he considered Rambhau Marathe, Vasantrao Deshpande and Chhota Gandharva as his gurus. The music of Marathi stage shows – “ Natyasangeet”- was his speciality and he excelled in playing both, the harmonium and the organ in various plays and concerts.It was as if he were born with a mental scale-changer, since, unlike many harmonium accompanists, it didn’t matter to him which scale the singer chose . He could accompany with equal fluency in all the scales. Whenever he played any “Natyageet”, you could literally hear each and every word of the song as he played it. He died on 31/1/1996 at the age of 70 years

Appasaheb Jalgaonkar (1922-2009)

Sakharam Prabhakar Jalgaonkar , popularly known as Appasaheb Jalgaonkar was born in Jalna district on 1/1/1922. He first learned vocal music from Balkrishnabua Chikhalikar but later shifted to playing the harmonium. He accompanied most of the prominent vocalists of his time as well as provided lehera accompaniment to most renowned Tabla players as well as Classical dancers He was awarded the prestigious Sangeet Natak Akademi Award in 2000 in Harmonium category. He died on 16/9/2009 in Pune

Purshottam Walawalkar (1923-2014)

Born in Sawant wadi on 11/06/1923, he was exposed to Gandharva gayaki from his childhood ,as his father was working in Gandharva company .He learnt from 3 Gurus – Pt. Vitthalrao Korgaonkar( Kirana Gharana) , Pt. Hanmantrao Walvekar (Agra Gharana) and Pt. Govindrao Tembe ( Jaipur Gharana) . Hence his playing style showed shades of all three Gharanas He accompanied most of the vocalists of his era and was always in great demand . His disciples incude Shrinivas Acharya . He died in Vile Parle on 13/01 2014. Walawalkar was awarded with the Pt. Govindrao Tembe Sangatkar Puraskar in 1999.

Manohar Chimote (1929-2012)

He was born on 27th March 1929 in Nagpur in a very wealthy family. He learnt the basics of harmonium from Bhishmadev Vedi around 1946 and later received advanced training from Laxmanprasad Jaipurwale of Kunwarshyam Gharana. He was a much sought after harmonium accompanist but later he gave that up and focused only on solo harmonium performances. He modified the harmonium by attaching swaramandal strings on top and named it the “Samvadini”. He also had a stint in the film industry in early fifties. He was a composer of many bandishes and also had a collection of rare “gats” from Bhishmadev Vedias well as Bhaiyya Ganpatraoof Gwalior. He received many awards ,the highest being the “Maharashtra Gaurav Puraskar”. He had many disciples the prominent being Pramod Marathe, Rajendra Vaishampayan Sharangdhar Sathe and Bhanu Joshi. Bhanu Joshi has painstakingly developed his guruji’s website where more information is available.

Tulsidas Borkar (1934-2018)

Born in Bori , a small village in Goa, his initial exposure to music was through the “Kirtans “ at the local temples. In 1948 he started learning from Chhota Gandharvaand his organist , Vishnupant Vashta in Poona. Later he came to Mumbai and for 10 long years ( 1957-1967) he got to learn from the harmonium wizard P. Madhukar. He excelled in harmonium accompaniment of classical vocalists as well as organ accompaniment to Marathi “Sangeet Nataks”. While performing harmonium solo his aim was to go as close to vocal music as possible. He taught at Sharda Sangeet Vidyalaya, Bandra from 2000. Among his notable disciples are Kedar Naphade, Seema Shirodkar,Sudheer Nayak, Ajay Jogalekar, Ravindra Chari , Shriram Hasabnis , Niranjan Lele and Prakash Vagal. He received many awards of which the most prominent are the “Sangeet Natak Akademi” award in 2005 and the “Padmashri” in 2016. Readers can access Kedar Naphade’s website for more information.