When I used to take lessons from PanditDipakChowdhury, our classes were held at the house of Panditji’s disciple Shree Shyama Das Chakraborty, who used to live at Tollygaunge. He was the superintendent of the Government Poultry at Tollygaunge. So we used to work at his place. This incident was probably from the year 1982, when Ravi Shankarji brought to Shree ShyamaDas’ house, George Harrison from the band Beatles; who was not particularly renowned for Classical Music though. He had come and I had met him also.
Pt. Ravi Shankar with his students
Another incident had happened after lunch, when Ravi Shankarji was waiting for his car to come and he was relaxing on the sofa. A student of Ravi Shankaji had come, who hadn’t been with him for long, and was a medical representative by profession. His name was PradipChakraborty and he used to live at Baguihati. So Pradipda had a question for Panditji.He asked how he does the Tehai in a consecutive manner. He asked whether there is a mystery lurking behind it.
Panditji had replied, saying that doing it isn’t a very difficult task altogether. He even cited an example for it, a very simple example of the Tritaal, which goes as DhaDhinDhinDha, DhaDhinDhinDha, Na Tin Tin Na, TeteDhinDhinDha. Pandit Di explained that the Tehai for this Taal would go as Dha Ti Dha, Dha Ti Dha, Dha Ti Dha. This was a simple Tehai he showed. Then he demonstrated what he had added to it, which goes as- Ta Dha Ti Dha, Ta Dha Ti Dha, TaDha Ti Dha. This ‘Ta’ that he added to every beat of the existing Tehai elongated the Taal. And he said that he repeats this lot of times. Basically it is very simple, but the interesting note here is that he would keep doing that for more than fifteen minutes on a stretch, without missing out on any beat. He would do the calculations on the spot, and perform according to it, thereby stretching the Tehai on and on. And he also said that this is nothing but practice. This I found very interesting.
I don’t know if someone has told about this incident. I heard this from Shyamal Bose, the husband of Mili Bose.
This happened sometime in the 70s, when begum Akhtar was to sing at Rabindra Sadan. The day of her programme coincided with the wedding ceremony of Pahari Sanyal’s nephew on his sister’s side. Naturally he would have to accompany his nephew as part of the groom’s retinue or ‘barjatri’. But he still paid a visit to Rabindra Sadan as Begum Akhtar would be singing. He went to the hall and sat in the front row.
Pahari Sanyal
When the screen went up, begum Akhtar spotted Pahari Sanyal and said, “Why are you sitting there? Come up here, on the stage…” and made him sit beside her on stage. Pahari Sanyal told her, “Begum, I was not meant to be here tonight, it’s my Bhanja’s wedding today. I have to go and join the Barjatri. I came only because you are singing today. It can’t be that you would be singing in Kolkata and I wouldn’t be there to listen! I’ll stay for one song and then leave. Please forgive me , I cannot stay today.
Begum Akhtar said – All right and then started singing.
And she sang it so splendidly, so wonderfully. After the song was over, Pahari Sanyal stood up and said – “Forgive me today, I must leave”….and started walking away towards the wings. But Begum Akhtar had went into the next song in the meantime, and such melody she had put into the opening of the song, it made Pahari Sanyal turn around and sit down there again. Eventually he stayed on for the full duration of the programme.
Later, after the programme was over, he told her, “You can well understand what my position would be in my family after this, what I would have to face when I return home. But what could I do? If you sing like this, what choice do I have? How can I leave such music?”
Tirthankar Banerjee is a well-known sitar player of Kolkata. He is a disciple of Sitar maestro Pt. Dipak Chowdhury.
Tags
Kabi Bishnu Dey, Ruchira, Vivekananda Park, Nikhin Banerjee, Documentary, Ramkrishna Mission Golpark, Vivekananda Hall
Language
Bengali
Tirthankar Benerjee speaks:
Note:- Here the speaker has referred to a documentary film ‘THAT WHICH COLORS THE MIND : THE LIFE AND MUSIC OF NIKHIL BANERJEE’ by Steven Baigel – Editor
This is an incident which I would have said about anyway, but since Pt. Ramesh Mishraji left us yesterday, I think it fit to be told at first, as he was involved with this. This was in the 1980s – I do not remember exactly, but close to1986 or 1987. At that time music was released on cassettes. The recording for PanditSwapanChaudhury’s first Tabla on cassette was being done at Audio Centre Studio at Behala. Recording started at around 7 in the evening. Rameshda, Pandit Ramesh Mishra was keeping the Nagma on Sarengi. Pt. SwapanChaudhury was to play the VilambitTeentaal.
Pt. ramesh Mishra
This happened at the very beginning of the recording. When everything was ready, recording had started, Pt. Ramesh Mishra, playing with his head down, started with a short Auchar and went in to the Gat. He had played it exceedingly well, even within that short timeframe. When he arrived at the ‘Sam’, it was expected that Pt. SwapanChaudhury, sitting opposite from him, would take his entry from there. But he did not play anything, just sat there, looking at Rameshda. Rameshda played a few more matras, then, having heard nothing from SwapanChaudhury, he looked up.
Pt. SwapanChaudhuri was so engrossed in his music that he said, even though the recording was going on, “Ramesh, you play today, I am going to listen to you. You are playing so well that anything I play after this will ruin the ambience. You go on playing, I will listen you today. The recording can wait for some other day.”
This incident naturally left Rameshdaembarrassed and he stopped playing. The recording was done afresh. But this incident has remained imprinted in my memory.
Amlan Das Gupta is a Professor of English, Jadavpur University, He has built an archive of North Indian classical music at the School of Cultural Texts and Records at Jadavpur University. He has also offered a course on the history of North Indian Classical Music. Education – University of Oxford.
Tags
Bangalore, Archive, Bade Ghulam Ali Khan, Concert Recording, Cassettes, 2007, 2008
Language
English
Dr. Amlan Dasgupta Speaks :
Data processed at SAP-DRS Lab, Department of Instrumental Music, Rabindra Bharati University.
Amlan Das Gupta is a Professor of English, Jadavpur University, He has built an archive of North Indian classical music at the School of Cultural Texts and Records at Jadavpur University. He has also offered a course on the history of North Indian Classical Music. Education – University of Oxford.
Tags
John Barlow, Mustaque Ali Khan, Radio Recording, Cassettes, Venezuela, 1960’s
Language
English
Professor Amlan Dasgupta Speaks :
Data processed at SAP-DRS Lab, Department of Instrumental Music, Rabindra Bharati University.
Amlan Das Gupta is a Professor of English, Jadavpur University, He has built an archive of North Indian classical music at the School of Cultural Texts and Records at Jadavpur University. He has also offered a course on the history of North Indian Classical Music. Education – University of Oxford.
Tags
Abdul Karim Khan, Live Recording, Karachi, 1930’S, Seth Narayan, Bal Gandharva
Language
English
Dr. Amlan Dasgupta Speaks :
Verbatim:
There is something which is for me, might be a great experience which I have had for the last five years, is listening to live recordings of Sahib, which was recorded by in the early 1930s by a Karachi or Lahore business man called Narayan on some equipment which I have not been able to indentify. He was recorded in ten mini clips. So what recorded in ten minutes at that time I have no idea. Books don’t say anything about it. History of technology is silent on this till date, what thing it is, because it was interwar period or and clearly what they were, for instances, transcription discs. But they weren’t here at India.
Ustad Abdul Karim Khan
It is possible that Seth Narayan got it from somewhere. He was a rich man, he used to fly aeroplanes. At that very early time, he was very fond of Bal Gandharva. He likes the recordings of Bal Gandharva. But he has three or four recordings of Abdul Karim Khan Sahab. This the only thing only time I have been able to hear.
