School’s Out

Ganguly also remembers Akhtar as a generous musician, who indulged fans who went backstage with requests to learn a particular ghazal she had performed. ‘‘She was also a very moody and sensitive person, she saw everything as either black or white,’’ adds Ganguly.

There’s no trace of her classical credentials in Dhinak Dhinak Dha sung for Vidhu Vinod Chopra’s Parineeta. ‘‘The challenge was to not sing like a singer,’’ says Ganguly, of the wedding composition that is part narration and part song. In a grasshopper green boota Benaras silk and tastefully applied raven eyeliner, with her feet tucked under, Ganguly looks ready to break into a seated dhamal—less Bollywood, more arty.

‘‘I’m not really into Bollywood and did the film only because it was Sarat babu’s story,’’ she says, referring to the Sarat Chandra novel that has been adapted to celluloid.

Her father KL Ganguly was a freedom fighter and once shared an apartment with Sarat Chandra. ‘‘In fact, Sarat babu chose my father’s bride—my mother who was 15 years younger than my father.’’

Parineeta opens with Ganguly’s song, which has been composed by Shantanu Moitra. ‘‘I was really happy that the lyrics were written by Swanand, one of my students from NSD,’’ she adds.

Stage memories span over three decades and 691 students, including the likes of Naseeruddin Shah, Pankaj Kapur and Irrfan Khan. ‘‘I learnt to reach out to this generation’s audience after training arrogant, ambitious and overconfident actors,’’ she says.

Ganguly takes to the stage again with Ganga Kinare, a project on Benaras that combines both theatre and music. ‘‘I’m also doing a new album with Western classical and Hindustani classical vocals,’’ she says. ‘‘There will be thumris and nazms set to guitar and piano.’’

The Delhi-based singer trained in dance and theatre before she was drawn to singing, and believes that the last was her acid test. And the talim she received from both her gurus still weighs on her heavily. ‘‘I’d like to let my hair down now and come out of the shadows,’’ she says.