Bhangra Moves: From Ludhiana to London and Beyond

304 Pages·2010·16.382 MB·English

by  Anjali Gera Roy

Bhangra Moves

Bhangra Moves
From Ludhiana to London and Beyond
anjaLi gera roy
Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur, India
First published 2010 by Ashgate Publishing
Published 2016 by Routledge
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Copyright © 2010 anjali gera roy
anjali gera roy has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents act, 1988,
to be identified as the author of this work.
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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
roy, anjali gera.
Bhangra moves: from Ludhiana to London and beyond. –
(Ashgate popular and folk music series)
1. Bhangra (Music) – History and criticism. 2. Popular music – India – Punjab – History
and criticism. 3. south asians – Foreign countries – Music. 4. Popular music – indic
influences.
i. Title ii. series
781.6'291421-dc22
Library of Congress Control Number: 2010920890
ISBN 9780754658238 (hbk)
Contents
List of Figures and Tables vii
General Editor’s Preface ix
Acknowledgements xi
1 Flows across the Chenab 1
2 no Mixing Please! We are indian 29
3 Mann Panjab De: Fabricating authenticity 49
4 Naqqal, Mimicry and the Signifying Monkey 79
5 global Bazaar, Local Peddlers 103
6 Desi Networks 129
7 Cool guys, Desi Boyz and Panjabi Munde Dance the Bhangra 153
8 Performing the Panjabi Body 175
9 Bhangra nation 199
10 Who Speaks for the Jat?:vernacular Cosmopolitanisms 223
Appendix 1 Music Survey Conducted Between 2000 and 2006 239
Appendix 2 Excerpt from Marketing Study on Panjabi Music
Conducted by Darshpreet Mann 243
Appendix 3 Glossary 253
Appendix 4 Incorrect and Correct Transcriptions of
“Mundian To Bach Ke” Lyrics 257
Bibliography 261
Index 283

List of Figures and Tables
Figures
1.1 Panjabi male dancers. reproduced by permission of Manjit singh 20
1.2 Panjabi female dancers. reproduced by permission of Manjit singh 20
3.1a Mann Panjab De – Pammi Bai. reproduced by permission of
Pammi Bai 51
3.1b Mann Panjab De – gurdas Mann. reproduced from
www.gurdasmaan.com by permission of gurdas Mann 51
3.1c Mann Panjab De – Malkit Singh. reproduced by permission of
Malkit Singh 52
3.2 gurdas Mann. reproduced from www.gurdasmaan.com
by permission of gurdas Mann 62
3.3 Malkit Singh. Reproduced by permission of Malkit Singh 69
3.4 Pammi Bai. reproduced by permission of Pammi Bai 73
4.1 Daler Mehndi. reproduced by permission of Daler Mehndi 88
5.1 Cycle of music production. reproduced from Mann 2000,
with permission 113
5.2 Perceptual map of the Indian music market. Reproduced from
jain 2000, with permission 121
8.1 Lohri fire. Reproduced by permission of Manjit Singh 191
8.2 The Panjabi clap. reproduced by permission of Manjit singh 192
9.1 The new generation – h-Dhami. reproduced by permission of
rishi rich Productions 217
Tables
5.1 Mass music and future scope. reproduced from jain 2000,
with permission 117
9.1 Bhangra singers. reproduced from www.punjabonline.com
(“Bhangra Artists” 2004) 216

general editor’s Preface
The upheaval that occurred in musicology during the last two decades of the
twentieth century has created a new urgency for the study of popular music
alongside the development of new critical and theoretical models. a relativistic
outlook has replaced the universal perspective of modernism (the international
ambitions of the 12-note style); the grand narrative of the evolution and dissolution
of tonality has been challenged, and emphasis has shifted to cultural context,
reception and subject position. Together, these have conspired to eat away at the
status of canonical composers and categories of high and low in music. a need has
arisen, also, to recognize and address the emergence of crossovers, mixed and new
genres, to engage in debates concerning the vexed problem of what constitutes
authenticity in music and to offer a critique of musical practice as the product of
free, individual expression.
Popular musicology is now a vital and exciting area of scholarship, and the Ashgate
Popular and Folk Music Series presents some of the best research in the field.
authors are concerned with locating musical practices, values and meanings in
cultural context, and draw upon methodologies and theories developed in cultural
studies, semiotics, poststructuralism, psychology and sociology. The series focuses
on popular musics of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. It is designed to
embrace the world’s popular musics from acid jazz to Zydeco, whether high tech
or low tech, commercial or non-commercial, contemporary or traditional.
Professor Derek B. Scott
Professor of Critical Musicology
University of Leeds