The night-long Sabrang Sangeet Sammelan on January 6 and 7 at Kala Mandir ended fittingly with a recital by Ajoy Chakrabarty, originally regarded as a prime representative of the style of Ustad Bade Ghulam Ali Khan, whose pen name was Sabrang. The Sammelan is organised by the Sabrang Music Trust as part of its drive to raise funds for the welfare of aged and ailing musicians. During the opening ceremony, Meera Banerjee, the senior-most pupil of the ustad, presented a cheque for Rs 1,75,000 on behalf of the trust to Mrs Rupali Moulik, general secretary of Matrisangha Janakalyan Ashram. The ashram's medical wing provides free service to aged musicians. The vilambit khayal in raga Bhairav with which Ajoy Chakraborty opened his recital early in the morning displayed the characteristic movements of the Kasur Patiala style he learnt under Bade Ghulam's son Munawar Ali Khan. In the drut khayals he demonstrated fast note permutations of Bade Ghulam Ali and delivered impressive taans. The gharana flavour was equally strong in the brief khayals in Gunkeli and the Bhairavi thumris he sang afterwards. The programme had opened a little before 11 p.m. on the previous night with brief khayals and a tarana in Bihag by Swyamduti Majumdar, a young pupil of Munawar Ali's senior disciple Sanjukta Ghosh. These, like the khayals in Kaunsi Dhvani she sang afterwards, were rich in the gharana flavour. In fact, tradition and continuity was the leitmotif of all the recitals at the programme. Drumscape, a performance featuring Bikram Ghosh on the tabla, S. Shekar on the mridangam and V. Suresh on the ghatam in adi talam, followed the tradition of the Carnatic tala vadya kacheri and the artistes, after brilliant alternate solo rounds, climaxed with thunderous bursts of simultaneous playing.