MAKING MUSIC

Gateway- a Business Standard Publication
February 2005.

Tutor Tune
by Subhra Mazumdar

There aren’t many things simpler and yet more harmonious than a classical music session in progress at Kolkata’s Sangeet Research Academy. Visually one witnesses a bare floor, on which are seated a master and a learner at a classroom session. Audibly, of course, it is a power-packed dynamism unfolding, for the method of learning is backed by centuries of experience, a tried out tradition and a methodology of instruction that is considered primary to this classical art of India.

Deliberately opting for the guru shishya parampara pattern of the gurukul system of education, the Sangeet Research Academy (SRA) has proved a point. While music schools elsewhere have veered away to suit the instructional formula of course and curriculum, this unique institution has proved that music performers can only be nurtured via the ancient and rigorous route of living in complete association with the guru.

For such musical excellence to be sustained in today’s somewhat alien situation, with uncanny far-sightedness, the selectors and formulators of its institutional makeup had launched a massive search programme for the right kind of guru. They had invited gurus who were out of the performance circuit and yet had a mine of knowledge to impart to disciples. Thus, master musicians from the various gharanas or schools of music came to take up residence at their premises and train a few disciples exclusively under their charge to help them pursue independent careers as performers.

At the start, this decision of selecting gurus was a radical departure from the then prevalent gharana cult, closeted into family folds and suspicious of outside exposure for fear of losing their exclusivity. Among other gurus there was the reluctance of leaving there native places and take up residence in far off Kalkatta. A few visionaries were willing to give it a try and one of the first volunteers was the late Ustad Nissar Hussain Khan a doyen of the Rampur Sahaswan gharana. He had agreed to make the shift to SRA from his native Atrauli on the condition that he would take under his wing as shishya, a grandson, Rashid Khan. With his demand readily accepted, the meticulous guru began the training process in a style of his own choosing. A staunch believer in the wisdom of the rod, he would set his disciple to practise each morning by making him repeat a single note for hours. If the little shishya dared to stray off into something different, the stern tapping of the rod would follow. The ustad’s legendary short-tempered outbursts often disrupted the smooth flow of musicality but the unswerving determination of guru and shishya soon brought matters on course. By age 16, Rashid was a promising performer on the ITC Sangeet Sammelan stage. Today Ustad Rashid Khan is a name to reckon with in musical circles.

This emotional security that is vital for the creative genius to blossom has given existing structures yet another twist. The gurus of the yesteryears were recluses, today’s gurus at the SRA are by and large artists who are in the prime of their concert careers. Displaying remarkable resilience and flexibility, and without sacrificing the basic tenets of their gharana requirements, these gurus have struck a fine balance between the performing circuit commitments and training schedules. Says Ruchira kale, a disciple of guru Ulhas Kashalkar, “When guruji leaves for a tour, he gives us homework. He also tells us some things that we can practise during his absence. After all, we are not beginners and we can continue to practise and do riyaaz on our own without daily guidance and when he comes back he will hear us and help us improve.”

Another category of gurus currently at the Sra is the Thumri queen Girija Devi, who after a sabbatical of a few years returned to the faculty and had already built a strong rapport with the disciples at the institute. This was specially evident during the Holi celebrations held there. Almost all the disciples gathered at her feet to be enlightened about the niceties of seasonal numbers in the Thumri chaiti mould of which the learned doyen holds supremacy of command. Thus disciples with other gurus are often encouraged to come to her doors and imbibe the nuances of her art. Among the current faculty are names like Pandit Ajoy Chakrabarty, Arun Bhaduri, Biresh Roy, Buddhadev Dasgupta, Malabika Kanan, Ustad Mashkoor Ali Khan, Abdul Rashid Khan, Shafi Ahmed Khan, and Shruti Sadolikar, who give the institution a direction and image. All of them have a proven track record as ace performers of standing and all of them have willingly adhered to the system of taking under their fold one or two of the twenty odd scholars and training them into performers during a span of a decade or a dozen years. In this task they have guided their charges into the performance circuit through small beginnings.

Structured into the parampara overlay, the concert training of each scholar, includes the Wednesday night recital by learner scholars of the SRA. This weekly concert is a public function for faculty and the public. That scholars take this occasion with deadly seriousness is typified by the manner in which Sandip Bhattacharya, a shishya of Ustad Mashkoor Ali Khan, rehearsed for it. During the practice session at the guru’s residence, Sandip looked like any other collegian, squatting in a jeans and shirt outfit, repeating a scintillating cascade of taan patterns after the maestro. In the evening, he appeared at the venue, the kurta clad ustad-in-the-making engrossed in checking out last minute details, and even socializing with the public in the foyer, for SRA scholars are made to project their music as both a visual and an audio composition with musicality and performance mannerisms learnt in equal measure.

As an extension of its ever increasing ambit of exploration, the SRA believes in keeping a close touch with other musician. These interactions are best seen at the sangeet sammelan stage. The customary mingling of SRA gurus along with the outsiders, is another of this sammelan’s traditions. Closing the sammelan evening with a bumper musical extravaganza is the flamboyant and melodious angle it adopts. A global touch to the evening comes into force when international greats like Ustad Zakir Hussain take the stage. While this mesmerizing wizardry may be the ultimate in musical experience, the SRA makes a flying start to each session by giving audiences a peep into its vibrant future through debut concerts by its qualified scholars. Amidst all these show stealers, the SRA has upheld its proven record of being an institution with a soul. Each year, this time round, the prestigious ITC AWARD, is given to a senior musician of unparalleled excellence. This year it is conferred on the sarangi maestro Pandit Ram Narayan. And listeners will have the opportunity of a live performance thereafter.

Kudos then to an institution that has rescued classical music from becoming a derelict wreckage teetering to a complete downfall in the hands of an impoverished courtesan, or being strangulated into silence under an indifferent bureaucracy, or being reinvented into a commercial show biz, or being prostituted into a plaything of the rich and the famous. Though its far sightedness it has created a system of effective learning, where the oral tradition is buttressed with guru shishya support, to uphold the structure of Hindustani classical music.