Manilal Nag

Manilal Nag was born on 16 August 1939 in Bankura town, in the Bankura district of West Bengal. He came from a family of musicians associated with the Bishnupur (Vishnupur) gharana. His great-grandfather Bauridas Nag and grandfather Govinda Chandra Nag were notable sitar players in Bankura, although his grandfather was not a professional musician. His father, Gokul Nag, was taken as a boy by the musician Ramprasanna Banerjee to Bishnupur and trained there in many instruments. Ramprasanna Banerjee was a son of Anantalal Banerjee, a disciple of Jadu Bhatta, the singer remembered as the Tansen of Bengal.

The family later moved to Uttarpara in Hooghly district, near Calcutta, where Gokul Nag lived in the zamindar's house as a music teacher. Manilal recalled that his father could play the been, surbahar, esraj, sitar, sarod, tabla, tabla tarang, harmonium and jaltarang, and that the dancer Uday Shankar came to Uttarpara to hear him and invited him to join his troupe as music composer.

As a boy in Uttarpara Manilal loved football and cricket, but his father would call him back to the sitar. He began at five or six, first learning dhrupad singing for years until tonsillitis affected his voice. He practised eight to ten hours a day, spent three or four years on paltas, meend, gamak and exercises, and then studied only two ragas, Bhairav in the morning and Sohini at night, for two years. For about seven or eight years his father would not let him listen to concerts or even the radio. Only then did his father start taking him to hear the great vocalists of the day.

His principal guru throughout his life was his father, Gokul Nag. He passed the Senior Diploma examination in music from Rabindra Bharati University with first class honours. The ITC Sangeet Research Academy noted that he had the opportunity to be close to musicians such as Ustad Allauddin Khan, Pandit Kanthe Maharaj, Pandit Omkarnath Thakur, Pandit Vinayakrao Patwardhan, Ustad Hafiz Ali Khan and Ustad Ahmedjan Thirakwa.

As a teenager he listened to Ustad Faiyaz Khan, Ustad Bade Ghulam Ali Khan, Kumar Gandharva, Gangubai Hangal, Siddheswari Devi and others. During his college years in Calcutta he went to Ballygunge to hear the dhrupad brothers Aminuddin and Moinuddin Dagar for more than two hours a day over two years, which he said gave him many ideas for alap. His father had told him that listening to vocal music would make him a better sitarist, because every instrumentalist must follow the voice, especially in alap. Among instrumentalists he was drawn most to Nikhil Banerjee's emotional mood, while also learning from Ali Akbar Khan's alap, Ravi Shankar's rhythm and Vilayat Khan's fast taans.

Manilal Nag made his debut at 14 at the All India Music Conference of 1953 at the Roxy Cinema hall in Calcutta, accompanied by Pandit Samta Prasad on tabla. About a month later he played at the nine-night Rag-o-Roop conference before Ustad Allauddin Khan, Pandit Kanthe Maharaj, Ustad Hafiz Ali Khan, Omkarnath Thakur and Vinayakrao Patwardhan, and Patwardhan announced from the stage that he would play again the next day with Pandit Anokhelal.

In 1954 he auditioned for All India Radio, accompanied by Ustad Keramatullah Khan, and was selected as an A grade artist. From then on he played the National Programme of Music, the Radio Sangeet Sammelan and most of the major music conferences in India. He became a top grade artist of All India Radio and Doordarshan.

In 1973 he toured abroad with a cultural delegation of the Government of India, visiting the United Kingdom and other European countries, the United States and Canada. He later visited Australia on behalf of the Government of India and toured Japan in 1985 with Pandit Mahapurush Mishra; recordings from those Japan concerts were later issued by Raga Records. In 1994 he toured the United States as an invited artist of the Sangeet Research Academy, playing in Woodstock, New York. His festival and concert appearances also took him to Italy, France, Austria, Switzerland, Germany, Fiji and Nepal.

He was accompanied over the decades by Ustad Alla Rakha, Pandit Samta Prasad, Pandit Kishan Maharaj, Ustad Keramatullah Khan, Pandit Kanai Dutta, Pandit Mahapurush Mishra, Pandit Shankar Ghosh, Pandit Anindo Chatterjee, Pandit Anand Gopal Bandopadhyay and Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri, among others. He also recorded on the surbahar and in duets with the shehnai player Ali Ahmad Hussain Khan and the violinist V. G. Jog.

He served on the Central Audition Board of All India Radio (Prasar Bharati), as an examiner for the University Grants Commission, on expert committees of university music departments and with the West Bengal State Akademi of Dance, Drama, Music and Visual Arts. He joined the instrumental faculty of the ITC Sangeet Research Academy in Kolkata in August 2005 and remained associated with it until 2011.

Teaching was central to Manilal Nag's life. Aimrec, his American label, says he trained more than 1,000 students, many of whom went on to work for Akashvani and at universities. In 2020 his daughter Mita Nag said he had more than 5,000 disciples around the world and that many contemporary musicians had practised at his Baghbazar home while he played along with them. His disciples include his daughter Mita Nag and the Kolkata sitarist Sujoy Basu. He was a firm believer in long, disciplined riyaz and systematic taleem within a gharana, and in a 1994 interview he warned students against treating recordings as a substitute for a teacher.

Manilal Nag lived for many years in Baghbazar in north Kolkata. His father Gokul Nag died in 1983, after which Manilal became head of the household. His daughter Mita Nag is a sitarist of the Bishnupur gharana, described as a sixth-generation musician of the family, and she often performed with him. In 1994 he also spoke of his son, Subhashish. Details of his marriage have not been made public in the sources consulted.

Manilal Nag saw classical music as a spiritual discipline. In his 1994 Raga Records interview he said music should be like meditation and yoga, staying as long as possible on a single note, and described music as the language of God. He said he did not understand the differences between religions, since every human being depends on the same air, water and food.

He was outspoken about the state of classical music. He worried that the end of royal patronage, economic pressure, television and pop music left young people little time for the ten or twelve hours of daily work real artistry required, and he criticised students who wanted to become performers within four or five years. He insisted on learning vocal music before instrumental technique, and said of himself, "as a musician, I will not follow the money, but money will follow me." He also said that his music was for those who understood it, and that he could not satisfy everyone.

Manilal Nag was one of the best known instrumentalists of the Bishnupur gharana, the only classical tradition that originated in Bengal, and he carried its dhrupad-steeped style to audiences in India and abroad. His daughter noted that he built his reputation at a time when the sitar world was dominated by Pandit Ravi Shankar, Ustad Vilayat Khan and Pandit Nikhil Banerjee. His recognition with the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award in 2001 and the Padma Shri in 2020, both firsts for a Bishnupur gharana musician, was seen by him as recognition of the whole tradition and of his father's scholarship. On his death the West Bengal Chief Minister said his devotion to music and his disciples had made him an institution in himself, and the Sangeet Natak Akademi issued a statement of mourning.

ITC Sangeet Research Academy Award (2001, presented 7 December 2001). Sangeet Natak Akademi Award for Hindustani instrumental music (2001), the first for a Bishnupur gharana musician. Koser (Kosher) Award, Pracheen Kala Kendra, Chandigarh (2005). Senior Fellowship, Ministry of Culture, Government of India (2005). Honorary Gold Medal, Asiatic Society, Kolkata (2008). Alauddin Puraskar, Government of West Bengal (2012). Banga Bibhushan, Government of West Bengal (2015). Padma Shri, Government of India (2020), the first for a Bishnupur gharana musician. He also received the Dover Lane Sangeet Samman, the Sangeet Ratna award in Mumbai, the Vitasta award in New Delhi and the Sangeet Mahasamman, according to Wikipedia listings.

Selected recordings: Raga Lalit, with Anand Gopal Bandopadhyay (Raga Records 213). Ragas Jog and Bhairavi, with Ray Spiegel (Raga Records 215). The Japan Concerts, 1985: Puriya Kalyan, Misra Piloo, Khamaj, with Mahapurush Mishra (Raga Records 103). Classical Music of North India: Raga Suha Kanada, and Ragas Puriya Dhanashri and Rageshri, with Mahapurush Mishra (Koch World Music Library; King Records, Japan). Ragas Darbari Kanada and Mishra Kafi, with Sankha Chatterjee (Dunya Records, Italy). Jugalbandi, Raga Desh, sitar and shehnai with Ali Ahmad Hussain Khan and Subhen Chatterjee (Rhyme Records). Harmony of Strings, with violinist V. G. Jog (Vista India). Raga Charukeshi, with Hom Nath Upadhyaya (Ravi Shankar Music Circle). Ragas Jogkauns and Saraswati, with Sabir Khan (Gramophone Company of India). Ragas of Dawn (2020): Bilaskhani Todi and Bhairavi, with Samar Saha (Aimrec). Many archival concerts, including a 1995 recital at the Sankat Mochan Sangeet Samaroh in Varanasi and a Tokyo concert of 1985, circulate on YouTube.

Manilal Nag died at a private hospital in Kolkata on the night of Monday 9 November 2026, aged 87. Family sources quoted by PTI said he died of age-related ailments. West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari wrote that he was "deeply saddened" by the passing of the legendary sitar maestro "late last night in Kolkata," calling him "a towering doyen and the proud torchbearer of West Bengal's historic Bishnupur Gharana." The state's Information and Cultural Affairs Department arranged for his mortal remains to be kept at the State Sangeet Academy so that disciples, fellow artists and members of the public could pay their last respects. The Sangeet Natak Akademi and its associate bodies also mourned his death. Funeral and resting place details had not been made public at the time of writing.