[surhall]

NAMSKAR,
SANGEET KA SAFAR HAVE THIS NEWS TO MUSIC LOVER
Babu Qureshi at his shop on PM Road, (below) a part of his collection


You will require at least five to six hours browsing through all the
stuff. Do you have the time, says Babu Qureshi brusquely. The tone
changes when I answer in the affirmative. Welcome to Past Collection,
Qureshi's vinyl shop, along PM Road. The outlet by itself is nothing
much to write home about, a mere 2ft by 2ft, but for music lovers it's
a treasure trove. For, this is the only shop in town that can boast of
original records of 78, 45, and 33 RPM and portable 4-speed players
and gramophones.


After retiring from his job at Kalton's Engineering Works Pvt Ltd in
1985, Babu Qureshi decided to convert his hobby into a profession. "I
have been collecting records since I was a child. After my retirement,
I decided to put my collection on display for the public," he says
proudly.


The records span seven decades of Indian music from the year 1931 to
1975 encompassing all genres of music from Hindi film songs to
classical performances to Rabindra Sangeet to speeches and Rashtriya
Gaan. Some of them are rare gems like the paper record that carries Pt
Nehru's speech when he went to the US for the first time, followed by
the national anthem. Or, the vinyl with a duet sung by both Saigal and
Rafi from the film Shahjahan. The song is special because it was also
Rafi's debut. There is also a 45 RPM containing the only two English
songs Rafi ever dared to sing.


Apart from Hindi film songs, the collection also boasts of original
recordings of Ustad Bade Ghulam Ali Khan, Ustad Amir Khan Saheb,
Beghum Akhtar, MS Subbalakshmi, Mubarak Begum and Ustad Bismillah
Khan, Pt Ravi Shankar, Pt Anand Shankar to name a few.


In a market full of new age gadgets, a portable record player or a
gramophone might seem a tad obsolescent. But not if Babu Qureshi can
have his say. He feels so long as there are true patrons of music,
vinyls will never go out of demand. "Where can you get purity of voice
like this? They represent an era, they fill you with emotion. Each
time I listen to these records I get goose bumps. They touch a cord
inside me. Can any of your CDs create this effect?"


Babu Qureshi gets most of his stock from private collectors, mostly
children and relatives of noted singers or music composers or private
collectors who consider records to be outdated or no longer identify
with the music of yore. Interestingly, not all the stuff in his shop
is for sale. "It's my collection. I cannot give it to just about
anyone," is the logic he comes up with. So while the rarest of rare
are for keeps (he does even let people copy the songs, if interested),
the rest are for sale, again depending on the type of customer he
gets. He also claims that some new age music directors have approached
him for rare tunes that they can pass off as their own. "Of course I
declined the offer," he says, but he refuses to name any one of them.


Till 2002 Babu Qureshi used to sit on the pavement of PM Road, but
after GR Khairnar, the former municipal commissioner, evicted him from
there, he decided to buy a shop. Much of his collection was destroyed
by the BMC and despite suffering huge losses he did not lose hope.
After consulting his family, he sold off his house to buy a small
shop. With the leftover money he bought much of the lost stuff. Today,
he lives in a rented room at the cost of Rs 3,500 per month, which he
finds difficult to pay at times. His shop is his only source of
income. He sells and repairs players too. Financially, it's a hand-to-
mouth existence. He cannot pay for his son's education. But nothing
can deter him from living his dream -that of making an archive of
Hindustani music.


Hence the appeal: Don't scrap your vinyls. Let Past Collection
safeguard our musical heritage for Generation Next.Babu Qureshi can be
contacted at: 22830998


dhall

see his shop picture.
http://www.4shared.com/file/14167427/1b8fe...I_HIS_SHOP.html