Three music concerts, one by a Pakistani exponent of kheyal style of singing, the second by an Indian dhurpad singer and the third by a German woodwind ensemble were the highlights of cultural activities during the past week, which the culturally enlightened citizens of Lahore enjoyed much.
Votaries of classical music in Lahore were treated to a mellifluous concert of vocal variety of classical music presented by Ustad Wasifuddin Dagar, an Indian artiste of repute on December 14 and 15. His first performance was at Averi Hotel, where he rendered two ragas, Lalit Gauri and Behag and the second at the premises of a music NGO, Sanjan Nagar Institute of Philosophy & Arts, where he sang three ragas, including Multani and Chanderkaus.
On both those occasions, he received the rapt attention of the audiences and praised for his exquisite performance of classical asthai-antaras (compositions) in dhrupad style of classical vocalisation.
The other concert of classical music was held at Shakir Ali Museum in Lahore, which was sponsored by Pakistan National Council of the Arts on December 15. Billed as a musical evening with Ustad Habib-ur Rehman, it attracted a large number of votaries of classical music of whom there is no dearth in the city. Ustad Habib-ur Rehman, is an inveterate practitioner of classical and semi classical genres of melodic expression, whose music is appreciated by knowledgeable connoisseurs and lovers of classical modes. In addition to giving private tuition to quite a few students he is currently teaching music at the National College of Arts, where he has joined its recently established faculty of musicology. A number of his students have already shown results and much potential.
In recent weeks several highly billed concerts of Pakistani classical music have been held in Lahore, which point to the resurgence of this neglected art. Already, professional gharana musicians are seeing a ray of hope for them to carry on with their ancestral profession of carrying forward their rich melodic traditions.

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The third music concert was presented at the Cultural Complex of Lahore Arts Council on December 16, which featured a German/Austrian Woodwind Ensemble consisting of flute, oboe, clarinet, horn and bassoon. The chamber music concert featuring the works of such luminaries as Ludwig van Beethoven, Franz Danzi, Gyrogy Ligeti, Paul Hindermith and Luciano Berio was organised by the Annemarie-Schimmel-Haus in collaboration with Goethe-Instut, Karachi and Lahore Arts Council. Musically enlightened Lahoris, whose interest in Western music was manifest in their enthusiastic spontaneous applause, appreciated the 66-minutelong performance by the visiting Austrian Orsolino Quintet.
Frequent exposure to Western music of different varieties through the courtesies of foreign embassies in Islamabad motivate the vivacious people of Lahore to remain in touch with the modern trends in Occidental melodies, which have in recent years created an impact on the indiginous Pakistani music.
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In the midst of these enjoyable cultural activities, the citizens of Lahore also observed December 16 as a day of mourning, as 33 years ago this day the Indian army mid-wived through a surgical operation the birth of an independent state of Bangladesh. senior citizens remember with much pain the aggression committed by the Indian Armed Forces against Pakistan in its former Eastern wing and forcibly detached it from our motherland, when our friends both in the East and West looked the other way.
A number of events were sponsored by several political parties and social/educational organisations in the city at which the government was urged to punish those elements, who caused the bifurcation f Pakistan on December 16, 1971. A majority of the speakers at various functions held in the city blamed dictators Ayub Khan, Yahya Khan and feudal politicians from West Pakistan for the break-up of Quaid-e-Azam's Pakistan into two parts. They also urged the politicians and the establishment to learn lessons from that history and stop indulging in such pursuits which will endanger the very existence of Pakistan.