Bhimrao Hasurkar Sastri

A Maharashtrian Brahmin, Bhimrao Hasurkar Sastri was a student of the Gwalior Gandharva Vidyalaya. He came to Santiniketan in 1913/14 and started to teach Hindusthani classical music. Music was always an important part of the curriculum in the Vidyalaya, but the music taught was Rabindra Sangit. Bhimrao Sastri was good at instrumental music and taught the students tabla and the pakhwaj. He was a very good teacher and classical music under his tutelage did not seem difficult even to school children.

He came to teach at the school but with the establishment of Sangit Bhavana he started teaching there and was its second Adhyaksha from 1923 to 1927. He learnt Rabindra Sangit and became a fine exponent of it. For the convenience of Bengali students he compiled two volumes of Hindi songs written in Bengali script. In another book, Ragasreni, he wrote an introduction to Hindusthani ragas and raginis as followed by Pandit Bhatkhande. His Sangit-Gitanjali was the first anthology of Rabindra Sangit in Devanagari script with notations for the non-Bengali music lovers.