Tin Pahaarer Gaan

I came across Birendra Chattopadhyay's work when, I believe, I was in high school or in first year of college. My impressionable mind immediately fell in love with his work. He was never a mainstream poet. But his poetry borne a unique and strong voice which I seldom found in others. Around the same time I found a cassette published by School of People's Art which contained songs and recitation of Birendra Chattopadhyay's poems. The songs were created out of his poems by Binoy Chakrabarty. He did and excellent job. Together with the poems and this cassette, Birendra Chattopadhyay made a lasting impression.





I loved a long poem called 'Tin Pahaarer Gaan' literally "The song of Three Mountains" or "The song of a mountain called Tin Pahaar". I starts with 'Pahariya madhupur metho dhulipoth' and continues to give a vivid and wonderful imagery. Around that time I also started composing songs. So I put tune to it - not tothe whole poem though. I stopped when I thought was the right moment for a song to stop. This was 1988-89. I kept it to myself and never published it. In 2007 I arranged it. This is that song.