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From Village to Southall
Culture moves when people move. The story of bhangra in Britain is a story of migration, of work and of invention.
Arrival
From the 1950s and 1960s, many Punjabis came to Britain to work in factories, foundries, transport and other industries. Communities formed in places like Southall in west London, Birmingham, Wolverhampton, Leicester and Bradford. They brought their language, their food, their religion and their music, and they built the places to enjoy them: community halls, temples, weddings and, later, nightclubs and daytime events.
For the first generation, bhangra was a link to home. For their children, born and raised in Britain, it became something more complicated, a way of saying "we are British, and we are also this."
A British sound
Something new happened in the 1970s. Young Punjabis in Britain began to combine the sound of Punjabi folk with the instruments and production of Western pop and rock. Published histories trace the early scene to bands such as the Bhujhangy Group in Birmingham, formed in 1971, whose song "Bhabiye Akh Larr Gayee" is often described as an early example of Punjabi music with Western instruments.
In 1977 the band Alaap formed in Southall, founded by Channi Singh and Harjeet Gandhi. Their 1982 album Teri Chunni De Sitaray is often mentioned as a landmark. In the 1980s the sound grew rapidly. Bands such as Heera, DCS and Apna Sangeet became popular, and artists such as Malkit Singh, with his band Golden Star, toured widely. Channi Singh later received an OBE, and Malkit Singh an MBE.
The scene had its own economy. According to published accounts, bhangra artists sold huge numbers of cassettes in the 1980s, but because sales happened in local shops rather than in chart-reporting outlets, almost none of it appeared in the official charts. A genre could be enormously popular and invisible to the mainstream at the same time. Daytime events, sometimes called daytime discos or "daytimers", gave young people a place to dance, and radio shows such as Eastern Beat, presented by Danny Choranji on the Asian Network from 1989, helped carry the music to wider audiences.
Mixing it
In the 1990s the music mixed with house, hip hop and reggae. Producers and artists such as Bally Sagoo, Apache Indian, with his bhangra-and-dancehall blend, Panjabi MC and others pushed it into new places. In 2002 and 2003 Panjabi MC's "Mundian To Bach Ke" became an international hit, and a remix featured Jay-Z. Around the end of the 1990s Punjabi folk-style music also returned to prominence, helped by artists such as Jazzy B, Sukhshinder Shinda and later Diljit Dosanjh.
Each of these steps was a decision made by people, usually young British Punjabis, and each was an act of invention rather than imitation. When someone says "real bhangra is only the village version", remember that the Southall bands were also real, and that the music in your headphones today comes from their invention as much as from the fields.
Who got left out of the story
The accounts I have drawn on tend to focus on male bands and male dance teams. Women have always been part of Punjabi music and dance, as singers, giddha performers and organisers, and in the diaspora women have increasingly claimed bhangra too. A published account notes that second-generation diaspora women embraced a form that was "traditionally not for women at all". Keep that in mind when you read any history, including this one. Histories are written by whoever gets the microphone.
The lesson for teachers
When you talk about the music in class, say something about this journey. "This kind of bhangra music was created by British Punjabis in places like Southall and Birmingham" is a great sentence, and it is true. It tells the room that the music in the speakers is not an ancient artefact. It is a living thing made by people who are still alive, some of whom you could listen to, buy from and support.