Finding joy in music, in the autumn of their lives

These ladies and gentlemen are as passionate as any you will come across. And they don't mind playing to the gallery. 'Sargam' - acronym for 'Senior Artists Residents of Gurgaon After Music' - is a city-based music group with a difference. It's made up entirely of elderly folk who share a childlike enthusiasm for singing.

Sargam is the labour of love of Amarjeet Kaur, popularly known as Lilly Singh, a radio and TV artiste who has performed on AIR and Doordarshan. Lilly, 64, admitted to feeling a little lost when she and her husband moved to Gurgaon in 2002. But she found inspiration in her guru, Pandit Mani Prasad, a vocalist in the finest Hindustani classical tradition."I asked him, 'How do you pass your time?' He replied that he trains senior citizens in singing bhajans. He said that it brings them a feeling of peace, and at the same time he got to meet people," Lilly told TOI.

"I thought, this is something that I should do." So she offered to teach music to anyone who was curious to learn it. And from four students in 2013, Sargam now has 24. Lilly takes classes once every week, for free, at her DLF Phase-IV home. Here, she trains students in sargam, raags, geet, bhajans, and, of course, old Bollywood songs."I saw there was a lot of interest - people were coming from Palam Vihar, Suncity and Nirvana Country, all willing to learn. It's been three years since I started training them. Some now sing very well, others are amateurs - the amateurs will only sing in groups, while with the good singers, I make them sing solo."