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A painted Kalimba, an African thumb piano

A Date with a Magical Music Shop

Payel Majumdar

Rajasthan Musical Emporium, a tiny shop  in Pahadganj, Delhi has the widest variety of instruments available in the city currently.

Love for music blossoms in unexpected places, and in sudden encounters. Tucked away in one corner of Pahadganj, an unassuming shop will blow you away with the collection of instruments from all around the world and the love that the owner fosters for them. Walk up a flight of white-washed stairs and you will pass a regular mannequin in loose cotton pants and a leather satchel, and there lies Rajasthan Musical Emporium on your right. Enter the shop and it feels like you have entered into a magical land, an Aladdin’s cave for music lovers. Outlandish instruments which you might have sourced from your travels abroad, or read of or heard about in your musician/traveller friend’s stories line the shop quietly. The treasures include Didgeridoos (an Australian instrument often referred to as a wooden drone pipe developed by the native aborigines), the Afghani Rabaab, idiophones like the African kalimba (also known as sansa or mbira ), percussion instruments like the Persian daf; you name it and they will produce it, along with an anecdote to boot.

One of the shop owners Irfan Ali, a rough-and-tumble man with a shock of curly hair told us about how he left Rajasthan and convinced his brother to open this shop with him for he wanted to be associated with music at all times of his life. His passion reflects in the number of instruments that he can play and knows about. Irfan Ali proceeds to show us around his green felt covered shop, as we gingerly touch a baansuri here, a Ravanahatha there (ancient string instrument believed to have originated from Sri Lanka, it has a bowl made of coconut shell and two sets of strings, horse-hair and steel, believed to have been played by kings who were patrons of the instrument during medieval times).

Ornately carved Turkish darbukas, colourful African djembes and the Persian daf, a large surface shallow frame drum (made of hardwood, with metal ringlets and with a goatskin membrane) painted after the Victorian style with the Queen’s face, are strewn about the floor. The veena, iktara, dotara, a range of sitars and guitars (along with other more obscure varieties of string instruments) are all lined up against the wall, as are other instruments strewn about like some sarods, a miniature shruti box and a bucket full of morchangs (used in folk music of Rajasthan, Sindh and Tamil Nadu, a morchang/morsing also called a Jew Harp is a horse-shoe shaped wrought iron instrument which is held between the teeth; and played).

In case you’re planning on picking up a new musical skill, in search of lesser known instruments (making and playing which have become a dying art even), or just want to spend a memorable afternoon with nothing much to do and in a mood to explore, this is where you should head to, which is what we did too.

To reach Rajasthan Musical Emporium, go to Shop No. 5133, Main Bazaar, Paharganj, or call 8882392234. 

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