As is the reverential ritual of Sree Satyananda Devayatan, the heavenly haven of music of all genres, the holy birthday of the Divine Maa Archana Puri (23 July) was celebrated in the Devayatan Hall. Spread over five days, it included a few heartwarming puja and homa sessions, along with nostalgic discourses and cultural evenings as offerings to literature-performing arts-loving Maa, an amazingly versatile genius groomed by Sree Satyananda Dev. Frankly, the cultural events reminded me of a Bengali proverb: Ganga-jale Ganga-puja. All the items presented in the form of elocution of poems, musical drama, dance drama, or multihued devotional songs were penned and tuned by the Saraswati Incarnate, and she has left a rich legacy of embracing all artists of every genre. Like Sree Thakur, she knew that the seeds of refined classical arts, if sown early in a child’s psyche, can never reap a criminal. Conversely, it has the power of transforming the devil into a divine soul. The Devayatan, therefore, cannot do without music on a daily basis—what to say of any special occasion like the beacon’s holy birthday!

Well-known classical vocalists Anirban Das and Diptam Sinha, worthy disciples of Vidushi Mandira Lahiri, are very good trainers as well and have formed a group of dedicated singers. Dexterously led by them and tabla virtuoso Pran Gopal Bandopadhyay, the group sang quite a few compositions of Maa, essentially based on the rainy season, with superb coordination, emotion, and perfect execution of finer nuances. For any group presentation, this is a tall order and needs a lot of practice sessions. The commitment of the duo was apparent and highly commendable.

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Welcome Monsoon 

The second edition of Sawan Smaroh, jointly presented by Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan and Delhi-based eminent tabla maestro Durjay Bhowmik-led NADD Foundation, was held at Satyajit Ray auditorium (1-3 August). Intriguingly, every evening featured one eminent local artist and another from some other state.

Kirana Gharana’s dwindling Northern stream looks up to its most thriving Dharwad stream. Pandit Vinayak Torvi has contributed a lot by grooming several exponents of this stream. Dhananjay Hegde, his worthy disciple, opened the second evening with Miyan Malhar, an inevitably chosen monsoon raga. The aochar was a little shaky, but ‘Karim naam tero’ set to slow ektal and sensitively supported by Durjay Bhowmik’s unobtrusive tabla and Kamalaksha Mukherjee’s harmonium, was very steady. The badhat plunged down to the lower octave. Introspective moods had surprise elements in the shape of short and sharp phrases. Silsila of notes maintained with all ensuing etiquette. The aesthetic tension before touching the upper tonic was enjoyable. Antara followed soon, and increased tempo facilitated different designs of sargam and gamak taans and led to a madhyalaya bandish beautifully painting the monsoon and opened a barrage of taans that continued with commendable neat grain in ‘Mohammad Shah rangeele set to very fast ektal. Hegde etched his next raga, Kedar, in no time. The treatment of the bandish had a fleeting touch of Agra, but the asymmetric taans were very much Kirana. One relished the play with the mukhda of the rich literary lyrics of an ektal Bandish, followed by sharp, neat taans.

Renowned sitarist Ashim Chowdhury with tabla maestro Parimal Chakraborty decided to play a mood of Raga Desh. Lighter nuances paved the way for a longish alap. When Pancham arrived, he played phrases covering one octave on one fret by pulling the string with very effective meend. His technically brilliant sitar mostly whispered sweet nothings in slow teens. There was no silsila, no format of gatkari. It was somewhat a mixture of dhun and gatkari. Suddenly cascading taans arrived with powerful bol and thonk phrases. The jati-based tabla solo round was superb. A well-known teental gat-bandish showcased powerful taans, enjoyed by the tabla.

The first day commenced with the recital of vocalist Shobha Chaudhary from Indore. In the second half, Shiraz Ali Khan, the great grandson of Baba Allauddin Khan, the founder of Maihar Gharana, showed his mettle while portraying Raga Desh Malhar on his tuneful sarod. His gharana’s favorite Zilla Kafi was also very pleasing, with an equally enjoyable accompanying tabla of Pandit Ramdas Palsule of Pune. The artistes of the final day were celebrated Carnatic violinist Mysore Manjunath with son Sumantha and accompanists Durjay Bhowmik with Somnath Roy on the tabla and ghatam, respectively. The grand finale was scripted by vocalist Pandit Sandipan Samajpati, ably assisted by tabla maestro Parimal Chakraborty and harmonium wizard Hiranmay Mitra.

Malhar Utsav

The Ramakrishna Institute of Culture celebrated Malhar Utsav by featuring vocal and instrumental duets on 3 August at Vivekananda Hall. Swami Supurnananda blessed all by reiterating that music is the best Sadhana. It helps self-realisation.

The pre-requisites of a fair and actual jugalbandi were fulfilled by Anol Chatterjee and Brajeshwar Mukherjee because: a) Both are vocalists; b) both learned from the same Guru, Ajoy Chakrabarty; and c) Both have earned almost the same amount of experience in singing and teaching under their learned Guru’s supervision.

The duo opened raga Megh with an exquisite keyphrase-led aochar that had a lot of Agra elements and closed with the dhrupadi mantra Om Hari Ananta Narayana. Gourab Chatterjee, a trained vocalist belonging to Agra gharana, merrily added frills through his singing reeds. It re-confirmed Indore-Kirana gharana’s visionary torchbearer Pandit Amarnath’s prediction on his first visit to Sangeet Research Academy in the early 1980s: ‘SRA is going to become the hub of synthetic gayaki very soon.’ However, the superb aesthetic sense of the limits of poetic liberty made their rendition, replete with all the components of khayal gayaki in slow ektal, Madhya teental, and very fast ektal, highly commendable. They could do even better by restraining the extra-fast speed of their vowel taans, which slipped off occasionally. Tabla maestro Tanmay Bose affectionately allowed them to enjoy their music making by adding zing.

Usually Patiala ‘thumri’ turns out to be a dadra set to fast jat, dadra, or chanchar, but the Majh-khamaj thumri rendered by the duo was in jat and followed the leisurely mizaj of Purab Anga Gayaki with excellent bol banav having complete sentences. Harmonium was in elements during this phase. The laggi fell short of expectations.

The other duet was between eminent flautist Ronu Majumdar and Sarod maestro Debojyoti Bose. As expected, the alap in Myan Malhar went flat despite the high-pitched flute. In comparison, jod-jhala, dominated by Majumdar, was better. The rupak gatkari started with a beautiful piece on the Tabla of Ojas Adhia. All three engaged themselves in different laya-chhandakari and headed for high-speed jhala, an obsession with today’s world.

Morning Goes Solo

Sangeet Ashram organised a morning concert featuring Indore-based vocalist and organiser Shobha Chaudhary at Bharatiya Bhasha Parishad on 4 August, Sunday. Trained by several gurus, Pandit Vamanrao Rajurkar, Pandit CR Vyas and Vidushi Girija Devi, she has assimilated different nuances of melody-making in her style. Her first choice was Gaud Malhar, a meandering melody that demands a medium to fast pace to portray the raga with clarity. But due to longer and slower movement of notes, the auchar remained foggy. The traditional bandish ‘Kahe ho’ cleared the fog, and raagroop came out in its full glory. She did raga elaboration in aakar, eschewing the lyrics-based vistar; offered only gamak taans in barabar ki laya; and treated a bandish set to drut ada chautal the same way. She was definitely more comfortable while singing kajaris, jhoola, and dadra in the reassuring company of Ashoke Mukherjee and Pradip Palit.

The writer is as senior music critic