The ‘Classical Voice of India’ contest strives to make all the young and old practitioners of raag-sangeet aware of the real persona of each raga they choose to present. It is a tall order even for seasoned professionals to maintain almost invisible microtones that clearly define the raga’s features. The contest, conceptualized by Milon Debnath and organised by his devoted students like Arundhati Kahali Chowdhury, has been going strong for over a decade now, and the seeds sown by Debnath are flowering gradually.

With the blessings of Swami Muktinathananda, secretary, Ramakrishna Mission and Math, the finals were held in Lucknow. The venue, International Buddhist Research Institute, reverberated with the excited voices of 124 starry-eyed contestants and their parents. During the three-day contest (12-14 December), one was happy to notice the ascending trend of the quality bar along with the number of participants, but the total absence of dhrupad was concerning!

Advertisement

The three-day contest culminated in a grand, day-long prize distribution ceremony (15 December). It was followed by a captivating rendition of nom-tom alap and khayal in Desi Todi and Bhairavi thumri by renowned vocalist Waseem Ahmed Khan of Agra Gharana, who came down from Kolkata as one of the members of different teams of distinguished judges who evaluated the young vocalists, instrumentalists, tabla players and dancers.

Upasana De (Siliguri) was unanimously selected as the winner of ‘Classical Voice of India 2024’. A disciple of Ustad Mashkoor Ali Khan, this dusky talent’s husky voice displayed all the aspects of khayal in raga Rageshri with well-measured skill and emotions. Kolkata’s Rajarshi Chatterjee (disciple of sitar maestro Subhranil Sarkar) played ShyamKalyan and bagged ‘Vadyashree’ while ‘Tabla Nawaz’ title went to Indore-based Shivansh Soni. Lucknow’s Anshika Katariya (kathak) danced her way to ‘Nrityashree’. As a Jury (vocals), I found Vagisha Pande (Yaman), Mradul Kumar Awasthi (Multani), Yudhajit Manna (Yaman), Vaibhav Dev (Madhuwanti) and several others very promising.

Obeisance to Guru 

Magan Mandir, an organisation dedicated to Sangeetacharya Chinmoy Lahiri, organised its annual event under the guidance of Pandit Shyamal Lahiri and Vidushi Mandira Lahiri at Ramakrishna Mission Golpark in association with Bharatiya Vidya Bhawan and Infosys Bengaluru on 15th December 2024.

Celebrated tabla maestro Anindo Chatterjee’s solo recital staged the grand finale of the evening. Supported by Hiranmay Mitra’s adroit harmonium, he played teental with all the finesse of his style. As a penultimate artiste sarod maestro Debojyoti Bose, accompanied by Tanmoy Bose, portrayed raga ChayaNat with élan. The chemistry of both the Boses was very effective.

Essentially based on the compositions and ragas created by Chinmoy Lahiri, the merits of Guru Shishya Parampara were showcased by Mandira Lahiri and her disciples Anirban Das and Diptam Sinha Biswas. The duo sang soulful Sohini (rupak tala), Chaturang in Hindol (drut ektal) and very rare Kirwani Trivat set to 8.5 beats’ cycle. Mandira-ji’s matured delineation of ragas RupKalyani and Lalita, deftly complimented by Abir Mukherjee’s tabla and Shubhrangshu Mukhopadhyay’s harmonium, was very pleasing.

Earlier, the evening began with “Usha Sey Nisha” stringing ragas according to the time-scale theory. Tabla virtuosos Prangopal Bandopadhyay, Abir Mukherjee and Anirban-Diptam provided harmonium support with special care. Flautist Indrajit Basu etched Bhimpalasi aided by Soumitrajit Chatterjee’s tabla. This year Magan Mandir felicitated the famous singer, composer and arranger Kalyan Sen Barat for his contribution to music. The hosts Madhumita Basu and Sonali Chatterjee welcomed all with heartwarming reverence.

The Sun and a Star

One appreciated the courage of Sahana Banerjee, a steadily rising star among sitar virtuosos of her generation. She ventured to make the debut of ‘Santosh Banerjee Memorial Music Festival’ as a historical homage to her highly revered musician parents; and to achieve this she dared to face Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri, the octogenarian luminous sun of tabla!

The event was held at Satyajit Ray Auditorium (26th December). Sahana, very wisely, chose Yaman Kalyan, the oceanic evening raga that allows almost every emotion to spread its wings with all its shades and at its own pace. The comforting tapestry of slow alap, woven with loving meends had sparingly used shuddh madhyam as a beauty spot. The vociferous jod gushed out taans of varied designs while the muscle flexing jhala comprised powerful thhonks.

This skill show amused the Master of rhythm. He greeted the slow teental gat with an uthhan having dissimilar layers of tempos and tihais. An undaunted Sahana managed to sail through this stringent test, but each of the tabla solo rounds after a bunch of her taans, complex or linear, unfurled uniquely stringed phrases of mnemonics with distinctly different aural effects and topped with similar sounding tihai. The ease, with which these memorable moments were created by the veteran rhythmist, illuminated the fact that the weight of experience stands apart amongst the overflowing exuberance of youth.

The concluding Maand dhun’s sweet tonality on the sitar brought back the magic of Sahana’s emotive music-making to the fore. The sensitive tabla played only theka in fast jat to let the melody flow unrestricted. The mood prevailed till the end of a docu-film on the life and works of sitar and surbahar maestro Santosh Banerjee.

Birthday Bash  

The 8th annual programme of Sashruta presented Naad-Navati to celebrate 90 years of Guru Samarendra Sikdar’s inspiring life and legacy at Triguna Sen Hall on 28th December. Sikdar and Padmabhushan awardee Sarod maestro Buddhadev Dasgupta were close friends but with different temperaments. Both were brilliant students of Sangeetacharya Radhigka Mohan Maitra of Senia Shahjahanpur Gharana and both groomed numerous disciples under their exemplary guidance. The vast collection of a cool-tempered Sikdar made him the reference book of Dasgupta, who happened to be very impatient while Sikdar is very patient with each student, irrespective of their caste, creed and intelligence level.

In the auditorium, there were many celebrity musicians led by Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri who, on behalf of all, felicitated the revered guru of generations of successful instrumentalists, including sarod maestro Prattyush Banerjee. This intellectual musician believes in giving something unique in each of his recitals. On this occasion, he offered his obeisance to his first guru through a rarely heard raga Gauri (Bhairav thhaat). Its complex chalan, steeped in the melancholy of separation, had shuddh gandhar as nyas.

The jod comprised small chord-like phrases. The bol-based sentences were longer in keeping with raga’s gait, clearly etched with meends. Eschewing jhala, he very smoothly introduced teental gat and Debjit Patitundi’s sensitive tabla sensed the mood and took a quiet entry. The ornate taans having gamak, zamzama, bolbani, etc., led to drut teental displaying another angle of the raagroop.

It was time for taan-tihais now that ignited the tabla for the skill show. Very soon the excitement opted for a peaceful culmination. But the dhamar in Tilang, replete with gaurhar-style long meends and khandahari gamak-laden layakaris, accompanied by a broad-faced tabla, was a power-play. It was followed by teental gatkaris and jhala sans metallic cacophony.

Multitalented Shruti De, a brilliant Physicist pursuing PhD in the USA, is also a diligent disciple of Sikdar, learning sarod. Commencing the evening with Suprabhat Bhattacharjee’s tabla, she played a brief but neat version of raga Puria Dhanashri replete with auchar, slow and fast teental gatkaris and extra fast jhala. In the final slot Shantanu Bhattacharya sang raga Bihag. The ornate, restive elaboration remained constant in slow ektal, medium rupak and drut teental. The cluster thickened with complex taan-sargams. Subhajyoti Guha’s tabla and Rupashree Bhattacharya’s harmonium were more agile. The trio enjoyed the thrilling challenge but the raga got emotionally cut off.

The writer is a senior music critic