Rare instruments brought to fore again

Melodious evening

The second day of the recently concluded ‘Festival of Rare Instruments’ was an unforgettable treat for music connoisseurs.

A thoughtful initiative by IIC, it brought back some ancient instruments to the stage as well as the few competent artistes who still play them. A select audience had the privilege to hear these instruments and came away enchanted.

The IIC held the festival in honour of Manna Srinivasan, a former member of the Planning Commission and IIC’s music consultant who passed away in March this year.

It was Manna’s idea to bring together select instruments which are fading away from our cultural scene due to a lack of knowledgeable craftsmen who make them, training to play them and little professional prospects. He felt it is important to keep them alive so that our younger generations do not lose out on our rich musical heritage.

The second day saw gifted sitarist Jagdeep Singh Bedi initiate the evening with a beautiful rendition with Surbahar. The Surbahar is a bass sitar with its pitch one to four octaves lower than the conventional sitar. It has a large pumpkin fixed to the neck to act as a resonator allowing a deep, sonorous and long-lasting sound.

The invention of the surbahar, around 1825, is attributed to Ustad Sahebdad Khan, father of the legendary Ustad Imdad Khan, and is believed to have been developed to enable sitar-players to present the elaborate dhrupad style alaap traditionally performed on the rudra veena only. Jagdeep Singh Bedi is one of the very few remaining concert performers of the Surbahar in the country today. At IIC, he rendered raga Kalyan and Shankara, accompanied by Varun Jha on Pakhawaj.

The beauty of the instrument itself left many in the audience awestruck. A rare sight these day, its swan head and intricate wooden carving made it a pleasure to behold, and the performance thereafter left everyone in a trance . The sweet, meditative sound of Surbahar filled up the air like the scent of a havan during a puja. One felt the artiste must be particularly blessed by goddess Saraswati to be able to play the Surbahar so beautifully.

This mesmerising performance of Hindustani classical was followed by a taste of the South. Kalamandalam Unnikrishnan of Thrissur and former principal of International Centre for Kathakali (ICK) and Kalabharathy Jayakumar of Kunnicode - a teacher with ICK at the moment, played Edakka and Thimila - percussion drums from Kerala.

Kalamandalam explained, “These were traditionally played in temples in honour of Lord Krishna. These days they are also used in Kathakali performances.”