Background
He was born to Khera Ram and Harnam Kaur.
He was born to Khera Ram and Harnam Kaur.
His trademark was his soft strumming of the tumbi and his turban tying style known traditionally as "Turla". Many consider him to be the pinnacle of the Punjabi music and an artist who arguably laid the foundation of contemporary music in East Punjab. His birthplace was Chakk Number.
384 in Lyallpur district in Pakistan and after partition of India in 1947 he relocated to the Jawahar Nagar area, Ludhiana in India.He was from Punjabi Khatri community.
He was trained in vocal singing by Pandit Dyall and Chaudhry Majid and his writing skills were honed by Sundar Das Aasi. His most famous songs were "" and "Satgur Nanak Teri Leela Nyaari Ae" and "Whisky Di Botal Wargi".
He recorded duet songs with Mohinderjit Kaur Sekhon, who was a recording artist with Associated Independent Recording, Jalandhar. He also popularized singing of Dulla Bhatti, Shahni Kaulan and Puran Bhagat.
His first recording was with HMV in 1952 and till last he remained with HMV. He also popularized the Tumbi, a traditional North Indian instrument.
His music has been sampled by Punjabi Military Cross on his best-selling bhangra album Legalised.