In its 7th year, the Swara Samrat Festival was held in two phases – one weekend showcased youngsters, and the following weekend featured the established doyens of the music arena at the prestigious Nazrul Manch auditorium in Kolkata.
As the festival is dedicated to Maihar gharana giant, Swara Samrat Ustad Ali Akbar Khan, the main festival opened appropriately with Pt Debashish Bhattacharya, an instrumentalist par excellence of the Maihar gharana. Additionally, this year the festival was a memorial to the late Vidushi Annapurna Devi (sister of Ustad Ali Akbar Khan) who passed away recently.
Debashish played raga Charukeshi. This is a raga with no prescribed time slot as it is from the Carnatic pantheon. Debashish gave it a gravitas not usually heard with slow “meend” work on the kharaj wire, gamaks, and pakhawaj style accompaniment by the great Pt Tanmoy Bose on the tabla during the jor section. Truly, this was a magnificent experience. The first gat was in an 11-beat cycle, a tribute to the great “layakaar” Ustad Ali Akbar Khan, combining the raga's strong melodic appeal with tantrakaari. The second composition was in Teen taal. He concluded with a lyrical maand on his ukele modified guitar named Anandi after his daughter.
Ustad’s ghazal
Jayteerth Mevundi of the Kirana gharana sang a Jhaptaal khayal in Vrindavani Sarang immortalised by Pt Bhimsen Joshi. His supple baritone wowed the expectant listeners; the “taans” were fast and intricate. The next piece was equally exhilarating “jaaoo main tore” in drut Teen taal. He concluded with Multani, whose pace was perhaps too fast for the usual challan of the raga.
Ustad Shujaat Khan played raga Jansanmohini with his usual élan. As a performer, he is completely at ease with himself, and his music shows it. The audience insisted on a light piece to end. He played “Rang sari chunari” in raga Mishra Pahari; as usual the Ustad prefaced this with a beautiful ghazal which he sang. Later, the Ustad remarked, “My father Ustad Vilayat Khan’s jugalbandis with Ustad Ali Akbar Khan were iconic and remain a benchmark of musicality and true musical collaboration. I too have enjoyed my jugalbandis with his son, Aashish bhai. (Ustad Aashish Khan). Playing at this festival is nostalgic for me – our families have really had a three-generation-long link.”
On the second day, flautists duo Carnatic Shashank Subramanyam and North Indian Pravin Godkhindi impressed with their immersive perofrmance. Their accompanists, Subhankar Banerji on tabla and Patri Satish Kumar on mridangam, were in equally good form. All four artists are the finest in their fields and the concert lived up to expectations. Raga Bhimpalasi was in turn coaxing, appealing, authoritative and dominating. The techniques displayed as well as melodic content were superb. Despite the expertise of the flautists, the two percussionists captivated one’s attention with their flawless performances and their solo pieces truly enthralled.Pravin Godkhindi highlighted that “playing with Shashank ji is challenging as he is really really good at his art, and also because he usually plays the shorter flute and that is more powerful and audible. We play the longer flute whose frequencies don’t really match up to the shorter flute.” Shashank concurred, “The Carnatic flute is played an octave higher and has eight holes as opposed to the six-holed North Indian flute. The fingering techniques and playing styles are also different.”
Pt Venkatesh Kumar, with his virile singing style in his beautiful bass voice brought in another mood – contemplative, sober and mature. The appreciative audience did not allow him to conclude with the Hameer, his second piece, and so he sang a brief “Ram dhan paayo”.
Raga’s contrasting facets
Ustad Ali Akbar Khan' s senior most disciple Pt Rajiv Taranath at 86 chose to show his erudition and maturity as a musician by playing raga Madanmanjari, an obscure raga with several contrasting facets, extremely difficult to interpret. This raga was created by the Ustad whom hedescribed as 'his Bhagwan'. His hands on his sarod look uncannily like his Guru’s, as is his introspective way of playing, not interacting with the audience, but being totally concerned with the music. This is now becoming increasingly rare. The maestro concluded the recital with another rare raga, Madhyam se Gara, in which he played three traditional gats of great beauty.
Laced with humour
The festival concluded with Ustad Zakir Hussain Khan and his team. This comprised Anantha R Krishnan, grandson of legendary Vidwan Palghat Raghu, on mridangam and Naveen Sharma, a rare dholak disciple of Ustad Allah Rakha, on dholak . The Ustad presented as always an expertly executed concert laced with his usual humour. The performance that is usually an hour-and-a-half long extended to well over two hours as the maestro was in his element.
The sawaal-jawab interchange with Anantha was an eye opener; it is not everyone who can match the Ustad’s thoughts and execution. A master showman in addition to being the most popular Indian classical musician today, Zakir’s act is indeed a hard one to follow – as Bikram Ghosh wryly said, “It’s hard to play the tabla when you live in the times of Ustad Zakir Hussain!”