Sunday, March 4, 2012

Indian Wedding Barat

In the Indian culture, wedding ceremonies include a procession called the barat which includes music and dance.  Outside of Indian, bands have been developed to perform at this specific ceremony.

In Europe, there are two groups that I found available for hire for Indian weddings. The Bollywood Brass Band is "the UK's pioneering Indian-style wedding band."  They have played for the wedding barat in hundreds of ceremonies around the world. They also perform other gigs. Here is a video of them playing for a parade with costumed dancers.



The Bombay Baja Brass Band is another Indian Brass Band in Europe.  They have performed for high profile weddings, processions for dignitaries, movies, and tv.  The following video link includes clips of people dancing to the band's music, the band playing for the Queen, and the band playing for a barat (0:53).

http://youtu.be/65WdcQvYP4k

The first barat band in North America was the Band Bajha Brass.  Their website includes audio samples of the music the music they play for the barat.  Once you are on their site, you will have to click on where it says "Band Bajha Brass" to access the audio recordings.

1 comment:

  1. This is very interesting! It would be really cool to see the other customs that are involved in such a wedding. I cannot imagine this kind of music at a wedding in the American sense; I bet they have alot of fun!

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