Reflections on the song

The seminar on Changing Profile of Indian Music in Mumbai discussed the issues that music faces as the values of a society change

February 11, 2016 03:54 pm | Updated 03:54 pm IST - Bengaluru

Protecting musical tastes and the audience:  (From left to right) Ustad Zakir Hussain, Aruna Sairam, Pt. Arvind Parikh, Javed Akhtar, and Shekar Sen Photo: courtesy Priyo Potsbangam

Protecting musical tastes and the audience: (From left to right) Ustad Zakir Hussain, Aruna Sairam, Pt. Arvind Parikh, Javed Akhtar, and Shekar Sen Photo: courtesy Priyo Potsbangam

Character is indeed shaped in the stormy billows of this world – this is not just about human character but also about the character of the arts too. Did any art, ever, emanate from the mind of the artiste alone? Was it – at any point in time – totally insulated from society? In the history of any art form, there may not have been such a time when art and society led independent lives. But perhaps, there is no time such as the present, when society has such a huge bearing on the nature of art.

A recent seminar at NCPA, Mumbai, on the Changing Profile of Indian Music – organized by the ITC Sangeet Research Academy (west) with Sangeet Natak Akademi and Music Forum – discussed the intermingling lives of art and society at length and detail, without losing sight of the real issues in its numinous elements. Illustrating it with an evocative example, poet and lyricist Javed Akhtar in his keynote address, spoke of the folk game, in which little boys whirl over their heads strings with pebbles at their end. As the action gains momentum, the string and pebble together gather larger bits of the sky into the circles they form. “But this is a paradoxical relationship. If you break the string, the pebble will fall, and if you remove the pebble the string cannot travel. This is exactly the way music and society work, they are interdependent, but it is also important that they determine each other, without either controlling the relationship,” he explained in a typical poet’s fashion. Music and life, he said, have always existed on the same pitch in this country. For instance, think of the music of the hilly terrains. It mostly doesn’t traverse the higher octaves, simply because of the lack of oxygen supply. Coastal music everywhere invariably has the same rhythm. “But there has been some disturbance in this process in the present, and the happy synthesis between life and music has been disrupted,” he observed.

Is technology which has changed the pace of our life responsible? Email, social media have become our new religion thereby reducing our patience for anything sublime. “If you continue to do an alaap for 20 minutes, you think a youngster will connect with you?” he asked the gathering of who’s who of Hindustani and Carnatic music. This is a society that demands instant gratification – whether it is the corporate or the connoisseur.

If we need to save our traditions, our arts, “we need to build bridges that can pull them up. Civilizations and cultures have to change, else they will wither away. We have to move with the times, and we have to change with confidence. Don’t forget, soft water cuts the hardest rock,” he said, making his point.

The questions did get a bit more by complex at the end of two days. Hitting the nail straight on its head in a session moderated by musicologist and sitar maestro Arvind Parikh, the tabla maestro Zakir Hussain took the instant gratification syndrome further to say, “everyone wants to be entertained”. The artiste is not out of this process – the musician wants to be an entertainer as well. “So we wear nice kurtas, stay in five-star suites and have turned music into entertainment. I don’t think it is a good idea to blame the young people when we ourselves have made the crossover,” he argued. Zakir Hussain has consciously decided to stay out of corporate events, and wedding concerts. “I want to do public concerts where I am in control of the event and my music,” he said. He narrated an incident that took place when he went for a wedding in Kolkata years ago. Hearing strains of the shehnai and sitar, Zakir Hussain walked to the lawns of an overcrowded wedding hall. People were having a good time eating and drinking, while the legends, Ustad Vilayat Khan and Ustad Bismillah Khan played on. That moment was so devastating for Zakir Hussain that he decided that he would never play at a wedding. While the tabla wizard stressed on the ethics and choices an artiste makes, Aruna Sairam, the renowned Carnatic musician and vice-chairman Sangeet Natak Akademi, said that she always sets conditions whether it is a corporate event or a wedding, ensuring that music has a definite place. Speaking in a similar tone, actor Shabana Azmi felt that the corporates could be told to behave in a sensitive manner. “You can control the backdrop and not the gentry,” Zakir Hussain categorically said. Shekar Sen, the Chairperson of Sangeet Natak Akademi, endorsed these views, saying: “You cut peepal trees. Later, proclaiming your love for the environment, grow money plants in bottles. Poetry and music is in the DNA of this country. People may forget Kings, but they remember poets and musicians. The practitioner is the most important person in this entire process.”

But if the society’s aesthetics cannot corrected, why should martyrdom be expected of an artiste? “As a society if we do not go to an artiste, an artiste will come to the society,” said Javed Akhtar. “Your solution in a democratic society is not protection, but the support of the people. And your support of the people will come only when you educate them. Otherwise, you will be depend on one maharaj or the other. Your real power and credibility will come from the people.” Culture, he argued, cannot be a monolith.

On yet another note, “What is purity? When does art become impure?” he asked Zakir Hussain. “I cannot give you an overview of tradition. But I can certainly speak of the last three generations -- my grandfather to my father to me. This is done with the belief that this is music in its pure form. Also because, you can see how it evolved, and are trained in a particular way so that you can take it in a particular direction. I remember how you had once said that a good poem is one which makes you think. Good music is similar,” observed the maestro. He remembered an incident when his father Ustad Allah Rakha’s friend proclaimed Zakir’s genius by saying how his art resembled his father’s. Allah Rakha had replied: “That’s a discredit. Zakir’s music should have his genius in it and not mine.” An important aspect of tradition is indeed continuity.

Change therefore, is inherent in tradition itself. Music, that is marked by great character, always stands the test of time. As Zakir Hussain said, the core remains unaltered, it may come in a new package.

0 / 0
Sign in to unlock member-only benefits!
  • Access 10 free stories every month
  • Save stories to read later
  • Access to comment on every story
  • Sign-up/manage your newsletter subscriptions with a single click
  • Get notified by email for early access to discounts & offers on our products
Sign in

Comments

Comments have to be in English, and in full sentences. They cannot be abusive or personal. Please abide by our community guidelines for posting your comments.

We have migrated to a new commenting platform. If you are already a registered user of The Hindu and logged in, you may continue to engage with our articles. If you do not have an account please register and login to post comments. Users can access their older comments by logging into their accounts on Vuukle.