Tansen, the famed court musician from Akbar's court waited for the court musicians to complete the musical interlude and then resumed singing, and it seemed hallways of the court, the gardens all echoed with a heavenly voice. Sitting in the zenana, the emperor's wife listened to him, alongwith her attendants.
“Oh!” said the Rani, “this voice takes me back to memories of my childhood, when I used to play with my siblings in the palace courtyard, it reminds me of the flowers, the garlands I used to make for the offering of our kul devi, the Goddess.
"And to me", said a maid who had a quiet face with sad eyes, the voice reminds me of my sister, we used to play together, till one day she stopped playing, and one day my father told me that she was no more with me. This voice takes me back to her I remember the happiness she brought in my life, and the pain of her parting.
And the littlest maid of honor broke the sad silence and said, "His voice, Queen, makes me think of the dawn before the dew is dry on the roses, when the birds are greeting each other, and the fawns skip and jump in the moist gardens and the black night has given way to the first golden smile of the sun. It is then I want to go forth and speak to all the living things that are so wide awake, and greet them, even as they greet the coming day. And when I hear his voice glad and happy then, Queen, I feel the early morning is with me and all the world rejoice in living and all the living rejoice in the world.”
“O Queen! When I hear his voice," said yet another companion of the Rani, “it is as if I were in the House of the Great God again, making offerings for the son that I wanted so much and was not born to me, or as if I sat again in the silence of the night and waited for the footsteps of him, my lord, who was my all on earth and now my all in glory."
And the sweet-faced widow turned away her eyes, wide-gazing into the distance, while in the audience chamber, the Singer, whose wonderful voice had roused memories sad, sweet and glad, in the hearts of the hearers of the inner chambers, stood smiling before the Emperor who showered upon him praises and gifts because of the joy his song had given him. Akbar the Great the Grand Mughal, Emperor of all that realm, he, the wise and just and learned King, had taken into his court Tansen the Singer, and into his heart, Tansen the Person.
It did not matter not how weary and tired he was, how sad he felt or how troubled his spirit, the voice of Tansen always soothed him into restfulness. The golden voice that filled the heavens with its beauty, that pierced the skies with its sweetness, that stormed the thunders with its strength, that cleft the clouds by its plaintive sadness. This was the magic voice that now thrilled through the heart of the King banishing every discord and crowning him with a peace and contentment that rarely sits upon the brow of King or nestles in the heart of man.
“O, Tansen,” said the Emperor, “tell me where from came this voice of yours, from where is the wonder of it? It is not of mortals, but of the gods. No other voice such as yours blesses the ear of man. I could go on listening to it forever”
“You are kind, Sire," the Singer replied, “but could you hear the voice of him if could you but hear him, all my poor efforts would be forgotten."
“This is always your answer, Tansen! But tell me who is he?"
“He is a hermit, Sire, my teacher my guru a saint who lives in the jungle of Brindaban. By all he is known as a holy man and his voice has the power of drawing all unto himself. Will your majesty go with me on a pilgrimage to the holy forest where you may hear for yourself this voice of wonder and forget that Tansen even knows how to sing?"
"No, my friend, yours is unjust humility. To forget your golden voice is impossible, for there is none like it. But gladly will I go with you to this hermit, your Guruji, to prove what I already know that you are the greatest singer of the world. Let everything be made ready for our journey tomorrow."
So the next day as the Emperor, disguised and seated on a huge elephant, started on a pilgrimage with Tansen to the latter's Guruji, he said to the singer, "Tell me, Tansen, how you met the Saint- Singer and how did you become you his chela?"
“It is quickly told, your majesty, it may interest you. My father was a Brahman living in the outskirts of a jungle. We were very poor and I was his only child. Often the passersby from the jungle would stop at our little fruit grove and pluck from the trees the fruits that meant the livelihood of our family. One day my father said to me, Tansen, my son, do you watch this side of the grove and call to those who steal from our trees.” So I sat within our little raised watch shed and while there I remembered how I had, one terrible day, heard the roar of a disconsolate tigress as she neared the village in search of her stolen cubs, and day after day I tried to give that roar until it became so perfect that my father fled from the grove on one occasion as he heard it, thinking a tiger was upon his land. After that our fruits were safe, for, as soon as I heard any one approaching with intent to steal, I gave the roar, and instantly they were lost to view in the distance. “
“One evening, as I sat in the watch-cot, I saw through the trees a band of men coming toward the grove. I gave my roar and all, save one, fled. But the one made straight toward me, looking not at me, but into the undergrowth. I shall never forget the love in his face. I understood only then the stories I had heard of these holy men, who feared neither man nor animals, and how, by their love sadness was banished from the hearts of the men they looked upon, and the savage beasts tamed into playfulness.
The saint struck at the trees with his staff to look for the tiger, then turned and looked at me hiding in my shed, and said – “What are you doing here, my little man? Have you no fear of the tiger that seems to be lurking near here?' “Oh no, I answered, “I am here to guard my father's fruit grove from the bold thieves that stripped them. There is no tiger here, sir, I roar at them and they think it is a tiger and flee from here. And so my father's trees are safe.”
“Smilingly he lifted me down from the cot and hoisting me upon his shoulders, walked toward the house where he spent the night much to the joy of my father and mother who felt themselves blessed by his presence within their lowly abode. The next day he left and I with him , He had seen possibilities in the voice of the child that could easily imitate the roar of a tiger, and had promised my father the reward of a world-famous singer for the sacrifice of his son. So I lived with him and loved him, this great Saint-Singer Haridas, until you, Sire, heard my poor voice and took me to your court and home, and most of all, to your mighty heart."
Two days later, as the sun threw its rays at the hillside, the King and singer found themselves at their journey's end, and Brindaban, holiest ground in all India, lay before them— Brindaban, sweetest word of Indian tongue, most sacred spot where Krishna walked and talked, and where lovers of Him still walk that they may immerse in the glory that His Blessed Feet have left on its dust.
There, in this forest of Brindaban, before a small hut, they beheld a man sitting in deep meditation, hands folded on breast, head lifted high, eyes closed, and on his brow the glow like the sun's first waking.
“See, there he is, my Guruji the Saint-Singer," whispered Tansen, reverently.“Hide here, Sire, behind these bushes and I will see how it can be brought about that you shall hear this voice so gloriously beautiful and yet so often silent in the presence of the idly curious. Gold, nor jewels, nor titles can bring it from that golden throat. But the smallest action of love will set it vibrating to the pulse of Nature's heart."
So saying, the singer prostrated himself low before his Guruji, who, wrapped in meditation, saw him not, nor heard him. Then lifting up his head, Tansen burst forth in a sacred song which his Guru had taught him years ago. Louder and louder rang the tone, sweeter and sweeter grew its beauty until suddenly the golden notes broke and harsh discord jarred on the listening ear. The Saint Singer opened his eyes and spoke.
“You are out of key. You distort the beauty of sound, Tansen, you who were so perfect, art imperfect and discordant, has singing in the court and the world lost for you the soul of harmony?”
The singer, who purposely had made the harsh discord, said - “O Guruji! I pray to you, sing the strain that I may again bring it to memory.''
Then the Guru lifted his voice and pealed forth the harmonies of Heaven-sounds. It told of the song of the stars, of the marriage of earth and seas, of the weaving's of love that give sustenance to man and all that lives, of the birth of Time and the crowning of Eternity, of the creation of gods and the dance of Love, each step of which is the making of a universe, each circle of which is the immutable law there are.
And, as he sang, Akbar fell on the ground drunk with the exquisite blessedness of it.
The chela stood wrapped in devotion before that Saint-Singer, and when the song ceased and its sweetness still throbbed through the silence of the evening, Tansen's hushed voice fell upon the ear of the holy man, saying, “The Badshah has come to pay you homage, Guruji"
And when Akbar the Great had fallen at the feet of the humble saint and risen again, he walked a little in the lengthening gloom with his singer and said, “You are right, Tansen, He is all that you say. You are a shadow, he a sun. You are as brass, he is gold. Why is this great difference and what is the cause? Both of you have the sound of Heaven in your voice, the gold of harmony in your tones. So like, yet so different”
“The difference, Sire," answered Tansen, “is as vast as you say, but the cause is simple. I sing to please an earthly King. He sings to please the King of Kings.”
