Padma Shri Malini Awasthi brings monsoon magic to Delhi in a folk music celebration

Malini Awasthi is a romantic who loves the rain, with “long drives, hot tea, pakoras”. For the Lucknow singer, the monsoon is a living memory of her village, with its dragonflies, peacocks, and the music of nature that has inspired Kajris (folk music genre) for centuries.

Folk singer Malini Awasthi bares her heart about music, New Delhi and more

As monsoon continues to hover over Delhi, Awasthi took the stage at Kamani Auditorium for ‘Sawan’, a rain-themed folk music concert, enchanting  the audience with her melodious voice, presenting Kajri, Jhoola, and Thumri compositions such as ‘Sawan Ka Nazara Hai,’ ‘Barsan Laagi Badariya,’ and ‘Gheri Gheri Aai Badariya,’ celebrating a season whose songs have long echoed through India’s heartland.

Delhi has always been special for the singer, who this year marks a milestone — 40 years since she first performed in the city, representing Uttar Pradesh at the annual trade fair in Pragati Maidan (now Bharat Mandapam) in 1985. “I was one of the youngest artists selected from UP,” she recalls. “Coming to Delhi, to perform and win over Delhi’s audience was every artist’s dream.”

Four decades later, Awasthi has performed in the city many times, yet returning for ‘Sawan’ still feels special. “For generations, Delhi has hosted some of the finest music concerts, with great listeners, you won’t find elsewhere. Delhi is such a big city where people of various cultures live. There is acceptance and appreciation for all kinds of music here,” she says.

Stepping stones

Long before she was celebrated as ‘India’s folk queen’, Awasthi was a little girl in Lucknow, singing and listening to folk songs and bhajans with her mother. She grew up in a supportive household — a liberal father and a mother who upheld values and tradition. Music entered her life at the age of five, when her mother insisted she begin formal training.  

“Who can be a greater teacher than the one who leads you to your guru? A mother recognises what a child is meant for, and music became my journey, my devotion,” says Awasthi, adding that Nirmala Awasthi, her mother, was her first guru. Today, anytime she steps onto a stage, Awasthi says her performances are a journey back to that childhood.

Road less taken

Folk music was a road less travelled when Awasthi began her journey in the ‘80s. There was already an audience for classical music and dance, but not for folk. “The perception was that these were songs grandmothers sang at home. Who would listen to them for three or four hours on stage?” she recalls. So, Awasthi built her own stage and her own audience. She credits her success to her training under renowned Indian classical singer Girija Devi in Purab Ang Thumri, a style associated with the Banaras gharana that often embraces folk traditions like Thumri and Tappa. 

As she started out, Awasthi recalls, there was skepticism about whether folk dialects could ever find a solo space on stage. Acceptance took time. There were times when she wasn’t taken seriously, faced judgment and endured dismissive comments. “I never pretended to be anyone else. The way I sing, dress, and carry myself — that is who I am. Folk is not a performance for me; I live in it,” she says. 

Since then, Awasthi has given what she calls her “200 per cent” to music. “It is 100 per cent for the artist. But for me as a woman, it has to be 200 per cent, because 100 per cent goes to the family, and 100 per cent to the career, where nothing gets ignored and nothing gets neglected,” she explains, noting how carving out a career as a woman made recognition and stability arrive slowly.

That sheer determination has taken her to Ahmedabad, Kolkata, Delhi, Pune, and Jalandhar — and also to the US South Korea and Spain — filling concert halls with listeners who now request songs they have discovered on YouTube. “For women, dignity on stage was once a huge issue. We have security, smartphones, and awareness. Back then, we were completely on our own. I wanted my inner strength and dignity to reflect on stage, through my music and presence. That, to me, is true women’s empowerment,” notes Awasthi.

Weight of folk

With having to create her own audience for a genre that was so underrepresented, Awasthi has often felt a deep responsibility to preserve and spread folk culture. “In an age when entertainment is on every phone, when people leave everything and come to listen to you, you instantly feel the weight of that trust,” she says. Seeing packed auditoriums with young faces often brings tears to her eyes. “I feel blessed that people are following folk music now," she adds.

Since the 1980s, perception of the folk genre, she says, has transformed. “Long ago, someone told an announcer not to call me a ‘folk singer’ — to just say ‘singer.’ But I said, let them call me that. If folk means the universe has accepted you, what could be a bigger honour? Today, people feel it’s cool to be called a folk singer. That gives me satisfaction,” says Awasthi. 

After 40 years and 4,000 performances, folk music remains Awasthi’s “cycle of life”. Her mother once sang to her, and now she sings to her daughter, passing on melodies that shaped her childhood. “When I sing it now, I feel my daughter is that daughter, and I am that mother,’ she says. “That is why these songs remain timeless. Every generation sees themselves in them; they feel, ‘this is ours’.”

This article is written by Adithi Reena Ajith