Nilima Sen (28 April 1928 – 28 June 1996) was a famous Rabindrasangeet singer.

Early life

Nilima was born as Nilima Gupta in

Kolkata Kolkata (, or , ; also known as Calcutta , the official name until 2001) is the capital of the Indian state of West Bengal, on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary business, comme ...

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

on 28 April 1928. Her parents moved to Shantiniketan when she was six. She had her education there and completed diploma course in Classical Music & Rabindra Sangeet from Santiniketan. She also did her B.A from the Visva-Bharati University at Santiniketan. She had the privilege of acting under the direction of Tagore but that was not staged. She sang in the presence of Gandhiji, Subhash Bose etc. during their visit to Santiniketan. Her Guru was mainly

Sailajaranjan Majumdar Sailajaranjan Majumdar (19 July 1900–24 May 1992) was a distinguished exponent and teacher of Rabindra Sangeet. Early life The son of Ramanikishore and Saralasundari Majumdar, Sailajaranjan was born at Baham, Netrokona, now in Bangladesh, on ...

. She started singing at the AIR and cut her first disc at the age of 16 and soon became famous. In 1950, she married Dr Amiya Kumar Sen and settled in Santiniketan. She has a daughter Nilanjana who also is a singer. She visited US with her husband and performed at various centres including BBC. She founded the music school "Surangama" along with Prasad Sen and later joined

Sangit Bhavana Sangit Bhavana (Institute of Dance, Drama and Music), of Visva-Bharati University, Santiniketan, started functioning as a part of Kala Bhavana in 1919 and as a separate institution in 1933. It was established by the Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tag ...

as a Faculty. For a couple of years, she taught music at Bardhhaman University. She became the Principal of Sangit Bhavana & retired from there. As a Faculty, she took part in various dance dramas like Tasher Desh, Mayar Khela (along with Suchitra Mitra), Sesh Raksha (along with Supriyo Tagore) organised by Vishwa Bharati & staged at auditoriums like Rabindra Sadan, New Empire Kolkata. Songs like "Chokher jaler laglo joar", "Aha tomar sange", "Bajao re mohan banshi" found correct expression through the embedded sadness in her voice. She performed all over India, Bangladesh, UK, US, Burma & Malaysia. Her famous students include Swastika Mukhopadhyay, Lily Islam, Basabi Datta, Rezwana Chowdhury Banya, Rita Ghosh, Pramita Mallick, Jayanti Purkayastha, Soma Roy, Aditi Mohsin etc. She has a number of music albums to her credit. She died in 1996 after a prolonged illness.

Recordings

In 2004,

Sa Re Ga Ma Saregama India Ltd. (Saregama refers to the first four notes of the Indian musical scale); formerly known as The Gramophone Company Of India Ltd. is India's oldest music label owned by the RP- Sanjiv Goenka Group of companies. The company i ...

re-released four singles by Nilima Sen: "Khelar Saathi, Bidaydwar", "Raja (Drama)", "Tomari Madhur Rupe Bhorechho Bhuban" and "Tumi Bandhu Tumi Nath". In 2005, sa re ga ma released "ki ragini bajale"-some 21 of her songs in a collection

References

External links

Nilima Sen
gaana.com {{DEFAULTSORT:Sen, Nilima Bengali musicians 1928 births 1996 deaths Visva-Bharati University alumni Rabindra Sangeet exponents 20th-century Indian singers Singers from Kolkata Indian women classical singers 20th-century Indian women singers Women musicians from West Bengal 20th-century women composers