Some heard and some unheard strains

Sursagar recently organised a santoor recital by Abhay Rustum Sopori at the ‘Music Discourse’ event at Alliance Francaise. This performance was a delightful evening full of notes and compositions, soothing the mind. The audience were happy to hear some unheard ragas too.

Abhay’s performance saw the accompaniment of Rajendra Nakod on the tabla.
The evening’s performance started off with raga champakali, which is a rare raga not sung by many musicians.

The piece started with the aalap and jod, which demonstrated the various technical nuances like glides, cross glides, double octave patterns, and more.

   The performance progressed to vilambit gat in ten-and-a-half beat cycle, which featured various rhythmic patterns.

Madhyalaya gat in the nine-beat cycle, which was based on sufiana tarana, demonstrated the balance of the vocals and the instrumental music and drutlaya gat in twelve-beat cycle, were the pieces that followed.

The first section ended with drutlaya bandish in a sixteen-beat cycle, in two compositions -- first a traditional composition Ek Pal Na Lage Jiya Mora followed by another composition by the artiste’s grandfather Shamboo Nath Sopori, which went Ta Nom Ta Dare Dim Dim Dim. Ati drut gat, featuring high speed patterns, concluded the piece.

The performance progressed with a Kashmiri composition by the artiste’s father Bhajan Sopori, which was followed by a musical discourse with the audience on various issues about the instruments santoor, Sufi music and music in general.

Commenting on the response received by the audience, Abhay says, “Even though the IPL season was on, and there was a Royal Challengers Bangalore match on, when my concert was happening, the hall saw a very decent crowd, and I congratulate Bangalore’s music lovers for that. Their dedication touched my mind, and this performance which was my first in the City, will always be special to me.”

Talking about the acceptance of the instrument along with other classical instruments, Abhay says that he sees no discrimination at all. “The acceptance of the instrument is tremendous.

The notes played on the santoor are very close to the human body and they cause a soothing effect on the listener, since its format is so pure, and that itself has helped to get the instrument noticed,” Abhay sums up.