The Bhendibazaar gharana is one of the vocal gharanas of Indian classical music, which originated in Bhendi Bazaar area of Mumbai in 1890. The founders of the gharana originally belonged to the Moradabad area of Uttar Pradesh. Upon migrating to Mumbai, their gharana became better known as the Bhendibazaar gharana instead of Moradabad gharana.

History and features

The Bhendibazaar gharana was founded around 1890 by brothers Chhajju Khan, Nazir Khan and Khadim Hussain Khan in the Bhendi bazaar area of Mumbai. The features of this gharana include using 'aakaar' for presenting khyals in an open voice, with clear intonation, a stress on breath-control, singing long passages in a single breath, a preference for madhyalaya (medium tempo) and use of the well-known Merukhand or Khandmeru system for extended alaps. Chhajju Khan's son Aman Ali Khan and Anjanibai Malpekar, are well-known exponents of this gharana. Amir Khan's father Shahmir Khan belonged to this gharana and passed on the tradition to his son.

Prominent exponents

Fourth generation- Disciples of Aman Ali Khan (1888-1953)

Fifth generation

Other disciples

Lata Mangeshkar; Vasantrao Deshpande; Manna Dey Kumar Gandharva; Kishori Amonkar; Begum Akhtar; Naina Devi Pandit Dayanand Devgandharva, Manoj Patel, Vasanti Sathe, Mukund Vyas, Sangeeta Pandharpurkar, Anil Vaishnav, Dwarkanath Bhonsle, Pandit Ishwarvhandra, Subhash Desai, Neelam Yajnik, Mitalee singh, Kiran Shukla, and Chintan Patel Asha Bhosle; Jitendra Abhisheki; Suman Kalyanpur; Pankaj Udhas