Raga Gaud Sarang

Sabri Khan performed Raga Gaud Sarang as the opening track on the 1992 album Immortal Series: Sarangi Maestro. The label T-Series released the recording on CD. The composition spans 15 minutes and 16 seconds, showcasing Khan’s mastery of the sarangi, a bowed string instrument central to Hindustani classical music.

The album belongs to the Immortal Series, a collection curated by T-Series to highlight seminal works by prominent Indian classical artists. Khan’s interpretation of Raga Gaud Sarang adheres to the raga’s traditional structure, characterized by its evening or early-night performance time (sandhi prakash raga) and the use of komal re (flattened second) and shuddha ma (pure fourth) in ascent and descent. The recording captures the intricate meend (glissando) and gamak (ornamentation) techniques for which Khan’s gayaki ang (vocal-style phrasing) on the sarangi became widely recognized.

Sabri Khan (1927–2015) emerged as a leading exponent of the sarangi in the 20th century, belonging to the Moraadabad-Senia gharana. His contributions extended beyond performance to pedagogy, with disciples including his son Kamal Sabri and grandson Sarwar Sabri, both of whom continued the lineage. The 1992 release stands as one of his commercially distributed works, though the full tracklist and additional session details for Immortal Series: Sarangi Maestro remain partially documented in public sources.

The album’s production reflects the transitional period of Indian classical music recording, shifting from analog to digital formats. T-Series, founded in 1983 by Gulshan Kumar, played a pivotal role in this shift by mass-producing classical, devotional, and film music on compact discs. Raga Gaud Sarang exemplifies the label’s effort to preserve and disseminate traditional repertoire through modern media.