Santoor maestro and renowned music composer Pandit Bhajan Sopori has passed away. He was undergoing treatment at Fortis Hospital in Gurugram.“We lost a really great musician, a great human being and a great father. It’s really hard for me to believe this and imagine my life without him,” his son Abhay Sopori told indianexpress.com. He added that his father passed away at 3:30 pm and was “ailing in the hospital for the last three weeks”.“He was suffering from colon cancer. He was 73, and would have celebrated his 74th birthday on June 22.”
Born in 1948, Pandit Bhajan Sopori hailed from the Sopore valley of Kashmir. He belonged to the Sufiana gharana of Indian classical music.Bhajan Sopori delivered his first performance at the age of five in 1953. In a career spanning over several decades, he performed in Egypt, England, Germany as well as the US.He learned western classical music from Washington University and Hindustani from his grandfather, SC Sopori, and father, Shambhoo Nath. In fact, Bhajan Sopori also taught music at Washington University.Sopori was honoured with the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award in 1992 and the Padma Shri in 2004 for his contribution to Indian classical music.