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Refreshing, but short
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Shujaat Husain Khan vowed Chennai with his infectious music, but it was over all too soon
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Photo: S.R. Raghunathan
Taking the audience along Shujaat Husain Khan
“Thank you all for coming to listen to me. I wouldn’t have come out on such a rainy evening to listen to a musician like me!” Opening with such disarming candour, Shujaat Husain Khan held court at the Music Academy with a sitar recital on the second day of the November Fest.
Some performers envelop you in warmth with their very stage presence. Shujaat Khan is one such. Refreshingly free of any deliberate showmanship — an affliction with some Hindustani musicians — he still carried the audience along with a quiet but infectious enjoyment of the music he made. And this is important, because, there is this strange truth that when the performer genuinely enjoys himself, that enjoyment percolates to the audience….
Enjoyable
That then is what one must first say of the concert — that most of the audience enjoyed it. Most also complained that it was over a bit too quickly — less than two hours. And he had said that he appreciated the effort we had put in to come to listen to him!
Raag Yamani was chosen for an unhurried elaboration. The raga takes both madhyams but employs the shuddha madhyam in a way different from Yaman Kalyan. The alaap bore the stamp of the gayaki ang practised by his renowned father, Ustad Vilayat Khan.
Trying to get closer to vocal music, this style tries to surmount the inherent limitations posed by the sitar in the realm of melodic continuity and sustain. The constant plucking of the strings required while playing the sitar vitiates this.
Working at one fret, say, the gandhara, Shujaat Khan produced little ripples that went all the way to the nishadha by simply pulling at the string, taking one’s breath away — this is what the gayaki ang is mainly about anyway.
The jod jhala portion exploits the potential of the sitar to create a kaleidoscopic effect with just forceful and rapid plucking of the strings with the mizrab; it is usually melodically simple.
Electrifying jhala
Shujaat Khan introduced small phrases here and there, a quick taan here, a meend there… The steadily progressive effect which the jod usually leaves was gone amissing. The jhala was electrifying as a vivacious stream of swaras falling on one another tumbled out.
He then presented a composition (learnt from Ustad Ameer Khan, he said) — “Nagara nand mukuta par vaari jaoon”. As is his wont, he sang the composition, even added a touch of abhinaya to it.
A couple of other compositions followed in increasing tempo — all in teentaal. With the mukhada (refrain) beginning at the 10th matra in the cycle, the point where the distinctive “tin” of teentaal is sounded, Shujaat Khan played some taans gracefully blending into the mukhada.
The aamad taans, where the taan is ended just one tantalising matra before the mukhada, created that happiness which comes from listening to well delivered, intelligent music.
The presentation did not score on tightness as he moved back and forth between compositions. Mercifully, it was free of tihais — those pre-rehearsed movements rendered thrice to reach the mukhada with arithmetic precision and a great deal of noise.
The concert ended with Shujaat Khan rendering some verses of Kabir and Hazrat Ameer Khusro singing and playing them alternately. The ragas chosen were Tilak Kamod and Khamaj. The verse beginning, “Chab Dikhaake” expressed the sufi mysticism of Khusro sahib — You showed me your face and stole my heart….
The Kabir doha, “Dukha mein sumirana sab kare” seemed quite out of place as far as the general theme of the verses selected went.
That presentation too, while appealing in parts mainly because of the potency of the verses and Shujaat Khan’s easy manner, suffered lack of plan and craftsmanship. It meandered away and all too soon the concert came to an end.
“Two tablas and no tanpura!” was the first impression as the curtains went up. The absence of the tanpura is explained by the fact that the sitar itself, with its sympathetic strings, provides the drone backdrop that one needs to play and listen to ragas. But there seemed little aesthetic purpose in having two tablas.
That being said, both tabla players (Arunangshu Choudhary and Sankar Debnath) accompanied with understanding, and the brief interludes when they came into their own were engaging.
LAKSHMI SREERAM
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