In 2009, Hari Chand presented me an old sitar which has been originally made by him and his brother, late Kartar Chand, in the 1970’s. The sitar suffered severely from a loose joint due to “an unfortunate fall from a kitchen table”…, dixit the former owner. How peculiar that no other parts of the instrument were broken. Since the owner wasn’t interested in this sitar anymore I was the lucky one to receive it.
During the second half of this year I finally found the time to repair and fully restore this instrument. Here are some pictures about the more spectacular part of the process. For this occasion I installed my home-made steam injector again. It has been serving me well in the past (click here), although its use is not always completely without risk. The steam can be very tricky and cause severe burns quickly. But everything went well. As for the joint itself: the wood was split at 2 positions due to an earlier joint adjustment. That’s why I decided to insert a completely new piece of wood.
Now this sitar is completely repaired and carefully renovated, ready to start a new life. It is a very light weight instrument, decorated in a very refined and exquisite way. There are 20 pardas, 12 taravs and a high quality staghorn jawari. The sound is superb, bright and clear, with an incredible tarav response. Well-known qualities for all sitars built by these two excellent craftsmen-brothers!
Today a legendary sitarshop has ceased to exist. Hari Chand, now 77 years old, brother of the founder of this Paharganj based shop, late Kartar Chand Sharma, finaly has definitively closed down the shop. After 50 years, an almost everyday dedicated handicraft in professional sitarmaking came to an end forever. So be it. There is no way back, there are no successors…
In 1940, young Rikhi Ram Sharma was making harmoniums in Kartar Music House in Lahore.
One day a casual customer gets Rikhi Ram Sharma interested in a sitar. He finds and opens a simple 7 string sitar to find out how it is made and starts learning making sitars from Sher Mohammad & his son Mohammed Maksud Ali (Usef Mohammed Ali) who are running another music shop “Sher Mohammad Sitar Makers” in Bansanwala Bazaar, Lahore. They make and play sitars since many years.
There he also meets Mohan Singh (31 years old).
In 1943 two young boys from Himachal Pradesh, Kartar Chand Sharma (18 years) & Hansraj Sharma (14 years), both clever and handy carpenters, join their uncle Rikhi Ram Sharma and Mohan Singh at Sher Mohammad’s shop in Lahore. They also learn how to make sitars and together they form a kind of basic sitar production line until 1947.
In 1947, partition split the country.
Mohan Singh initially went to Amritsar and then moved to Jalandhar (Punjab) where he started the Mohan Singh Shop. In 1959 his son (nephew ??) Gurdial Singh takes over the shop and later changes the name into Gurdial Singh & Sons.
Rikhi Ram Sharma, Kartar Chand Sharma & Hansraj Sharma moved to Delhi and started the Rikhi Ram Musical Instrument Mfg.Co. Their first workshop was initially planted in Paharganj but this is now completely demolished. The showroom of their music shop was build in Connought Place, where at present, the original shop is still there, now run by grandson Ajay Sharma.
They keep on working together until 1959.
In 1959 they get separated. Kartarchand starts his own workshop in Paharganj while in 1962 Hansraj founded Raj Musicals and got settled in a new location near Patel Nagar. The original Rikhi Ram workshop in Paharganj closes down and Rikhi Ram Sharma, together with his son Bishan Das Sharma, start a new workshop at another spot. They also attract new labour men.
Meanwhile, Kartar Chands brother Hari Chand arrives in Delhi in 1954. He gets married one year later and starts working as a mecanic craftsman at TW Carriage & Wagons workshop from the Northern Railway in Delhi. In 1962 he quits this job to join his brother in Paharganj, Together they start making sitars in the Kartar Chand Hari Chand shop at 9050/1 Multani Dhanda, Paharganj, New Delhi 110055.
In 1974 they adopt young (14 years) and tiny Kartar (Kaku) Chand Dhiman as a fixed helper. Kaku’s uncle was at that time working in the Rikhi Ram Sharma’s sitarshop and had asked to Kartar Chand Sharma to teach his nephew how to make sitars. They continuesly built highest quality professional sitars, surbahars & tanpuras. Occasionally also sarods and dilrubas. They also specialise in repair and maintenance and do frequently repair work for Rikhi Ram Musical Instrument Mfg.Co.
In januari 1993, Kartar Chand Sharma (69 years old) unfortunately passes away and Hari Chand Sharma continues the Paharganj Shop alone, regulary assisted by Kartar Chand Dhiman who himself worked out a “mobile” sitar maintenance and repair service in New Delhi for himself.
Today, Hari Chand Sharma aged 77, is getting retired. The Paharganj sitarshop will cease to exist soon. Kartar Chand Dhiman continues his flourishing mobile sitarwork in and around Delhi. He’s now busy constructing a new house in Dashrathpuri. It ‘ll have an extra room so that he’ll be able to do more sitarwork at home.
At the time of writing of this article, Hansraj Sharma is old (82 years) and sick and struggles for his life at home. His 2 sons Suman & Sanju keep on running the shop. They are specialised in Sikh musical instruments like saranda, sikh rabab, dilruba, taus, and sikh pakhawaj which were almost lost in history.
Some interesting economical info:
In 1960, the price of a 100% handmade Kartar Chand Sharma sitar was starting from Rs85 for a simple “student model” up to Rs150 for a professional and fully decorated version. Every now and then the price was raised per Rs5 only….
(Nowadays on e-bay seen $2500)
Kartar Chand Sharma, at their top, produced up to 10 sitars a month (non-decorated types = “student model” or VK model). According to the degree of decoration, the production time of a sitar easily doubles. The trio used to be assisted by a “polish” man and worked 7 days a week, from 7:00 hrs up to 19:00 hrs, many times up to 23:00 hrs. There was only one “holiday” per year, at Divali. That day they reserved for repairing their tools and sharpening the saws and chisels firmly, together with a profound clean-up of the shop.
Today, almost every sitar sold is made starting from a prefab sitarbody fabricated in Calcutta. Hardly anybody builds a sitar 100% handmade anymore. But nevertheless music business is booming. Musical instruments trade grows by 65% a year. (src Raj Musicals)
Raj Musical nowadays has +10 labour man in service at their workshop and 10 people employed in their expanding showroom(s).
Sources & info:
Hari Chand Sharma, interviewed by Klaas Janssens at his house in Dashrathpuri, New Delhi, 21/02/2012.
Article about musical heritage: “The last of the sitar makers” by Sonia Malik, published in The Express Tribune, 24/09/2011.
This time I returned from India with rather mixed feelings. My best friend, and sitarmaker – teacher Hari Chand is seriously considering to get retired. He is now nearly 77 years old and suffers from pain in his hands, his knees and other joints. The daily trip from his house in Dashrathpuri (near Dwarka sector) to the shop in Paharganj (easiliy 1 -1,5 hrs one way) takes more and more of his spare energy.
He’s built his last complete sitar in 2008. Since then he is slowing down and reducing his daily work. He was still doing some setting and assembling work on selected and checked Calcutta prefab sitarbodies but also this came to an end. Now only some basic sitar repair work remained. Also the frequency of his visits to his shop decreased to only a few days a week. Arriving in his shop sometimes at 11:00hrs only, the working day often doesn’t last long. From 16:00 / 17:00 hrs onwards he is getting ready to return back home. The visit to his shop becomes almost a time-pass picnic only…
The flourishing days of Kartar Chand & Hari Chand are now long gone. Both brothers were very dedicated in making first quality professional sitars and they are famous for their unrivalled repair work. They are very closely related to the other world famous New Delhis sitarmakers family Rikhi Ram. Late Kartar Chand Sharma has been learning the skill from his uncle Rikhi Ram Sharma and Sher Mohammad in Lahore, 1943.
This sitar was made in the “Sher Mohammad & Sons Sitar Makers”- shop in Bansanwala Bazaar, Lahore 1940 – 1950 by early sitarmaker Sher Mohammed. At that time, before the Partition, he taught sitar making to, amongst others, Rikhi Ram Sharma and Kartar Chand Sharma. At Partition time, both Rikhi Ram Sharma and Kartar Chand Sharma left Lahore and headed for Delhi where they both settled their own sitar shop (only 800 m. away from each other). Rikhi Ram’s shop became world famous due to Ravi Shankar and the Beatles. Kartar Chand, joined by his younger brother Hari Chand, remained low profile and continued making high quality professional sitars at Paharganj. They developed their own style of sitars and got specialised in repair work. Amongst their main customers was late Pt. Balaram Pathak, and his son Ashok Pathak. In januari 1993 Kartar Chand passed away, and thus leaving the shop to his brother Hari Chand.
Adding an extra cikari string to this old Kartar Chand surbahar to meet the Balaram Pathak Garana style requirements.
No new cikari kuti will be installed because of the surbahar neck construction. The imposant surbahar’s head is jointed to the neck. Therefore it is not obvious to drill an extra hole through this construction. But the solution is very simple: The first tarav kuti becomes the last cikari kuti. Since this kuti can hold every kind of string, there is no need for creating another new cikari kuti. I simply removed the first tarav string, drilled a hole in the outer kuti’s region and mounted the last cikari string to it. Optionally, later, i can always install an extra tarav kuti on the utter last position to regain the original tarav strings number.
On this instrument we have been re-directing the first (SA) cikari string under the patri. This results in an increased playing comfort concerning the Laraj Kharaj strings: no more incidental touching of the first cikari string while playing meend on the Laraj Kharaj strings.
This mod is then completed by adding an extra cikari slide on the jiwari, re-organising the cikari slide positions on the jiwari, adding an extra cikari pin and finally installing the strings itself.
The cikaris tuning is according to the raga specifications, but combinations like f.ex. Sa Dha Pa Pa do sound very nice.
Also on this surbahar, i mounted a new Kharaj string from German’s famous string maker Pyramid Strings. It is a nickel flatwound on steel .046w (1.22mm diameter). Superb string. Unheard long and deep sustain while playing meend, unrivalled tuning-stable, very soft and warm, deep bass sound. A real joy for player and listener…
This early 70’s original Kartar Chand sitar just left the restoration booth. Complete body check-up and new polish has been done by late Kartar’s brother Hari Chand in New Delhi in march 2009 while I was there on a visit. The celluloid mother of pearl imitation parda lanes have been renewed. My part of the job was to refurbish the original pardas and fit them again on the new lanes. I also made and fit new stagghorn jiwaris for main strings and taravs. The original tuning pegs were used again but some taravkuti-holes needed a new bushing.
Note the very fine finger grips on these taravkutis and also the remarkable cherry-round tumba-shape which is very typical on all Kartar Chand’s sitars.
This sitar sounds amazingly bright and has a vivid tarav response. The meends play very easy and the instrument is very light-weighted.
21 years ago Jay Scott Hackleman was so very lucky to be able to spend a whole year in the very special company of some of the world’s finest traditional sitarmakers, Kartar Chand & Hari Chand Sharma.
He wrote a profound article about his apprenticeship in the shop of Late Kartar Chand which has originally been published in The Journal of The Guilds of American Luthiers N°67 in 2002.
Hari Chand often talked to me about this “very fine young American person”. He showed me many pictures in his much used and thumb marked album. And during one of my last visits Hariji proudly presented me a beautiful copy from this unique article written by Jay. It’s a real extensive documentary (4,13Mb pdf), made with sincere care and love. Thank You So Much, Jay.
Today Tineke found a website about his present-day work.
In 2009, Hari Chand presented me an old sitar which has been originally made by him and his brother, late Kartar Chand, in the 1970’s. The sitar suffered severely from a loose joint due to “an unfortunate fall from a kitchen table”…, dixit the former owner. How peculiar that no other parts of the instrument were broken. Since the owner wasn’t interested in this sitar anymore I was the lucky one to receive it.
