The Story
OrganizerAmarrass Records was built on a paradox: the music it wanted to champion was simultaneously India's most deeply rooted and its least financially supported. Folk musicians from Rajasthan, Sufi vocalists from Uttar Pradesh, sarangi players from Sindhi and Multani traditions — these artists embodied centuries of living practice but had almost no access to the concert infrastructure that sustains classical and contemporary popular performers.
Ashutosh Sharma, who has worked in travel since founding Sadhana Travel Services in 1994, and Ankur Malhotra, who works in community radio and co-founded Madison Music Review, began Amarrass with recordings and artist management. The early years were spent in Rajasthan's folk music territories, documenting and releasing the music of artists like Lakha Khan — a Padma Shri recipient and master of the 27-string sindhi sarangi, described as one of the last remaining masters of this complex instrument.
But recordings alone could not do what Amarrass wanted to do: put these artists in front of new audiences in a setting that matched the intimacy and atmosphere of the music. The answer was Amarrass Nights. When the series launched in January 2020 at Sunder Nursery — the Mughal-era garden complex adjacent to Humayun's Tomb — the choice of venue was itself a curatorial statement. The 16th-century park's garden setting matched the contemplative, meditative quality of Sufi and folk music in a way that a conventional concert hall could not. Rehmat-e-Nusrat, a young qawwali group from Uttarakhand signed to Amarrass Records, performed the inaugural edition.
The pandemic forced a hiatus, but when Amarrass Nights returned, the format was renewed as a monthly programme. Co-founder Ashutosh Sharma described the energy at the return editions as a confirmation that the audience for this music, in this setting, was not only real but hungry for the series to return. The plan, as of 2022, was to make Amarrass Nights a reliable monthly fixture in Delhi's cultural calendar.
Amarrass Nights occupies a specific and important niche in the ecology of live music in India. India has strong institutional infrastructure for Hindustani and Carnatic classical music (the Sangeet Natak Akademi, the SPIC MACAY network, sabhas and baithaks), and a growing commercial infrastructure for contemporary popular and electronic music. Folk and living-traditions artists sit in neither of these systems — they are too informal for classical institutions and too specialised for commercial venues.
Amarrass Nights provides infrastructure that otherwise does not exist: a regular, ticketed, well-produced concert series in a heritage setting, with professional artist management and payment, presenting folk and Sufi artists alongside international artists from related traditions. The series has given Delhi audiences meaningful access to artists — Lakha Khan, Barmer Boys, Popular Meeruthi — who are internationally recognised but rarely presented in premium concert settings in their own country.
The Sunder Nursery setting also carries its own cultural weight. The proximity to Humayun's Tomb places the Sufi and Mughal-heritage music in a landscape that resonates with it historically, making the act of attending an Amarrass Nights concert a cultural experience that extends beyond the performance itself.
Folk and living-traditions artists in India have almost no premium concert infrastructure. Amarrass Nights provides what should, by rights, be provided by institutional arts funding: regular, well-produced, properly paid performance opportunities in settings that honour the work.
Over 70 events across Delhi/NCR and Jaipur. Presentation of Padma Shri recipients and internationally touring folk artists — Lakha Khan, Sakar Khan, Barmer Boys — in premium intimate settings for Delhi audiences. Launch platform for Rehmat-e-Nusrat and other artists signed to the label.
