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Ustad Rahimuddin Khan Dagar (1901-1976)
The second son of Ustad Allabande Khan trained under his father and uncle Zakiruddin Khan and also under his elder brother Nasiruddin and cousin Ziauddin. Had a highly erudite and spiritual approach to the art, and would invariably make many explanatory comments on the theoretical, spiritual and philosophical aspects of his music while singing. Apart from his traditional grounding in the music of his forefathers, he studied for a Bachelor of Arts degree at Aligarh Muslim University. He was the first member of the family to adopt the title 'Dagar', and the practice was eventually adopted by all members of the clan. Was well versed in sanskrit and persian, and spoke a very rich blend of urdu and hindi. He trained his son Ustad Fahimuddin Dagar and almost all his other nephews got some training from him. He had in his possession many rare sanskrit and hindi manuscripts and chronicles of his family, which were unfortunately destroyed in the riots following the partition in Indore, where he served in the court of Maharaja Holkar. After partition he found employment at the Bhatkhande College in Lucknow, where he however taught little. He had a vast repertoire of compositions much of which is however lost now.
Rahimuddin Dagar was extensively recorded especially in the 1960's and 1970's but due to poor archiving many of the recordings are now not traceable. The most extensive collection of his recordings on tape were with a Mumbai businessman late Lakshmi Narayan Pitti - a patron and well wisher. The NCPA in Mumbai recorded him for their archives in the 1970's and these recordings are well catalogued and accessible to the public. His earliest recording was a shellac recording released in the 1930's with rega Desh. Later HMV EMI released two discs with Todi/Miya Ki Malhar and Kedar/Bihag. After his death a recording of Raga Rageshree Kanada from the All India Radio archives was released on tape by HMV. Another recording of Raga Asavari and Darbari Kanada was released recently in Italy. The Sangeet Natak Akademi in Delhi has a few archival recordings.
Music files of Rahimuddin Dagar on the web :
http://sarangi.info/rdagar Raga Bihag
http://utterjoy.wordpress.com/ Miya ki Todi