The Emperor

Michael Jackson died. I am a great fan of his but this entry is not an eulogy to him. It is a lament; and a tribute to someone else.

I adore Jackson. There was a certain energy to his dances and songs that kept the viewer mesmerised. I often watch "The Way You Make Me Feel" even today. And I love it. My cousins had introduced Jackson to me when I was about 6. From Thriller to Billie Jean to plain moonwalking, I loved it all...

There was another musician who I discovered all by myself though. This is about him. Why? Because this great musician died too last week. Because you need to know about him. Because "The Times of India" (which I hope does not reflect really the times of India) had just a three line side column entry on his death (whereas it continues to splash Jacko over 5 pages every day since his death).

His name was Ali Akbar. We call him Ustad Ali Akbar Khan Saheb, or sometimes plain Khansaheb. It is understood that there is only one of his kind. Its difficult to describe his music, so I will tell you just stories I know. (Whether all true or not I don't know.)

Around the time I was 13 years old, I had just started playing the sarod. I was pretty interested in Classical Music at that time and I would listen to everyone and anyone with an LP or cassette recording. I had already found out Zakir Hussain and was looking for more of his kind. Then one day, I heard Medhaavi...

Here is the first of the stories. It dates back many years before I heard Medhaavi. On a particularly bad personal day in his life, Khansaheb as a young musician had run away from home and had decided to end his life by jumping from a cliff. Torn by the internal machinations of his mind, he did not jump that day. He created a raag. He called it Medhaavi...

Medhaavi is an outpouring of his soul. Medhaavi is the expression of that which is impossible to express. Medhaavi encompasses you completely. Medhaavi makes you forget that you ever knew or ever want to hear anything else again in your life.

Oh, I forgot - why was I playing the sarod? Well, another story. When I was about 12, my father (a very good general physican in my part of Calcutta) noticed a commotion outside his extremely small clinic. People were suddenly prostrating in front of an unseen entity and creating a major hullabaloo. My father recalls stepping out and not being able to believe his eyes. For in front of him was Ustad Ali Akbar Khan, flanked on the sides by Aashish and Dhyanesh Khan - his two eldest sons - whom I would eventually have as my gurus. Khansaheb had a concert in Calcutta that evening and was sick and worried that he wouldn't be able to play. Anindya, his disciple and my father's long time patient had brought him over.

Thanks to my father, that night Calcutta heard the maestro enraptured. Khansaheb was not ungrateful. He came back to the clinic the next day and gifted an autographed LP to Baba. He was overwhelmed that he had not just been able to play, but could play extra long. He asked Baba about his sons and when he came to know that I had been playing the tabla for some time, suggested that I start learning the sarod from his son, Dhyanesh.

I did.

But good music takes some time to be understood and although I started learning the sarod and heard the autographed LP at the first opportunity I found it, to be frank, dull for my tastes.

A few months later, I heard Medhaavi. I dug up everything in the house that I could find on Ali Akbar. I must have been deaf or blind or both. For streaming into my ears was the most profound and beautiful music I had ever heard in my entire 13 years of life! I heard the autographed LP again. This time at full volume.

Khansaheb's music was ethereal. It said so much at so many levels that I can't even begin to describe it. I wasn't sure whether I was hallucinating, so I heard these many times over. I went to Guruji (Dhyanesh Khan) and I told him the wonderful things that I was suddenly hearing. He smiled. But didn't say anything. He was (Dhyanesh Khan died a year into my training with him) a great guru. He wanted me to find my own path. He was my guiding light.

So I went to my father's other classical musician patients. I told them that Ustad Ali Akbar Khan was the greatest musician ever - and I asked for their opinion. To my utter surprise (and utter relief as well) they all agreed with me. They took me under their fold as if I had stumbled upon a secret society. They gave me membership willingly and immediately. They would rave and rant about Khansaheb till I got bored. I wanted to listen to more of his music. I wanted to listen to everything he had ever played.

Till then I had not been allowed to Khansaheb's live concerts. They were meant for "grown-ups" only. I was dying to meet him, to see him with my own eyes. I wanted to bring out that faceless music from the speakers into the visual domain. I wanted to meet this god. If his music was so beautiful, how beautiful would he be? I fished out a photo from him from the newspapers and drew a portrait of him and stared at it long and hard.

At that time I was also involved with "The Statesman in School". The Statesman was a widely read newspaper in Calcutta and we were the school volunteers who wrote about stuff we liked in a weekly edition called "The Statesman in School". Arup-da (Amitava Ghosh's son) was in charge and dearly loved by all of us. One day, he gave us a proposition. We could interview the star of our choice.

Ali Akbar, I had screamed out and had promptly been given permission. There were a few d******s in the other members who disliked the choice - because Western Music was the in-thing and also because they had never heard of Ali Akbar. (I suspect they also work for the TOI today. Heh! Heh!). That week Shiva (the rock group) was being interviewed and there was considerable excitement because of that. However, the good Arup-da fought for me and won. Both Shiva's and Ali Akbar's interview would go up in that edition.

Where is Shiva today, I ask you? Most of you probably don't recognise the name anyway...

Well, I had got my chance to meet the great man and that was all that mattered. I needed questions to ask him, but I didn't know what to say. I just wanted to meet him. My mother (I am eternally grateful to her) wrote down a bunch of questions for me and I called up Khansaheb's secretary and arrived there with my brother in tow. The average age of the interview team was 11!

We were asked to wait in the living room. Heart thumping I waited. How tall would he be? Over 6 feet? Was he an angry man? What if he scolded me or asked me to play the sarod for him? I became convinced I had made an error by opting for the interview. I could leave now, but Arup-da would be very disappointed...

My brother and I stood up as Khansaheb walked in. I was astonished. He wasn't more than five feet two I think, very dark and hobbled in with a pack of 20's Classics in his hand. He was going to light up, but stopped when he saw his "interviewers" and was as astonished as I was. My brother, all of 9 years, holding up a portable borrowed tape recorder and me, all of 13 years ready with pad and pencil.

"You are going to interview me?", he asked in a broken and husky voice. Ow, this is the person who created Medhaavi? But I was also afraid for Ustad Ali Akbar Khan was a giant among musicians. Before I could react, he looked half amused and half interested and settled down.

I learnt that the Ustad's legendary father, Baba Allaudin Khan had made him practice for 18 hours a day and would tie him to a tree and hit him with a stick if he didn't. I learnt that his father had finally appreciated his music when Ali Akbar was 50 years old. I listened to all this with wide open eyes.

How do you play the sarod like that, I wanted to ask him.

At the end of the interview, I slipped him the portrait I had drawn and requested for it to be autographed. "You have given me too much hair", he said rubbing his shining bald pate and lovingly signed the sketch.

That day, I met the greatest musician in the world. Apart from his music what made him so great? He lived in the knowledge that he was the Emperor. So he didn't worry about ego. He concentrated on his art and created music which words cannot convey. Indian Classical artistes are as jealous as they are talented and they often have ego hassles. The Emperor had surpassed ego because he knew in a completely egoless way, that he could not ever be surpassed. He had after all stepped out from the shadows of his genius father and made a brand of music which was completely his own. Some of us, know its Ali Akbar by just hearing the tuning of the sarod.

I saw his concerts after that. Live concerts.

How did he play? Did he smile at the audience from time to time? Did he shake his head and have mannerisms? Did he complain about the weather? Did he threaten the sounds guy?

No, to all of the above.

One of the first things you would observe about Ali Akbar on stage was that his hobble was completely gone. He would walk rapidly and purposefully to the dais. He would announce the raag and he would sometimes forget.

And then he would slouch down with sarod in lap. He would lower his head, close his eyes and disappear. In a few seconds you would hear the first strain of the sarod. Each string pluck would be a like a stroke of a brush with a different colour. You would see the picture appearing gradually with the aalaap. What went on behind Khansaheb's closed eyes is beyond anyone's wildest imagination, but his hands gave us ample glimpses of it.

For through his sarod, God used to speak...

Hariprasad Chaurasia doesn't play with Zakir Hussain - apparently because the latter hogs the limelight. Ravi Shankar stopped his first wife (incidentally Ali Akbar Khan's sister, Annapurna Devi) from publicly performing the surbahaar (larger cousin of the sitar) out of jealousy and fear. Kishori Amonkar routinely yelled at the poor sounds technicians. Vilayat Khansaheb wouldn't play at a concert because he himself had dropped tea on his own sherwani. Amjad Ali Khan tries tricking Bickram Ghosh by rehearsing a taal in the green room and then changing it on stage.

But Ustad Ali Akbar Khan - he just played the sarod. He played like there was no tomorrow. He played like that every time. He gave to you a gift no one else could. Each concert you would hold in yourself for the rest of your life. He used to say that each raag was a manifestation a divine soul in Heaven; and he tried to bring these souls down to Earth for his audience.

He is on record for having said that having practiced for 10 years, one could please oneself; after 20 years one could please the audience; after 30 even the guru. But you will need many many years more to please The Divine.

Khansaheb not only pleased The Divine I am sure, he also merged with It. Legend has it that even when he was sleeping his left thumb used to be upright and twitching slightly. (That's how the sarod is held.)

Once at the Dover Lane music conference, the organisers reminded him to announce the raag and taal before the concert. It was hilarious. With all earnestness, Khansaheb announced Bageshree Kannada would be the raag. And the taal would be....? He gets stuck, looks befuddled at Swapan Choudhuri (his brilliant and long time accompanist and a great musician in his own right) and both start giggling like teenagers.

"Well, I don't know", Khansaheb finally mischeivously admits - "Actually I haven't thought about it." The evening rolls on. Calcutta is seduced by the sarod and forgets all about the taal. Till Khansaheb starts the gat in jhaptaal, pauses briefly and to keep true to the organisers' wishes announces, "OK, now I know, it is jhaptaal". He smiles and sinks back to his closed-eyes-world in a mere couple of seconds...

And I have to tell you this. Once I heard Khansaheb with Zakir Hussain. Zakir was then half his age and I knew that his professional debut had been when he had accompanied the Emperor at the age of 11. But I had never heard them together live.

Two wizards on stage. A complete magic show with sur and taal. At the end of the concert most of the audience has been moved to tears by the concluding Bhairavi. Zakir flung himself at the Emperor's feet. The Emperor acknowledgesd Zakir, waved at the audience and smiled. We clapped our hands black and blue and cheered ourselves hoarse...

People of all generations need to listen to his music. For Khansaheb created music beyond music. He was himself solidified music in human form. India is grateful to have had him as her son.

Michael Jackson's dance videos will always be the same to me. I have them memorised. Ustad Ali Akbar Khan's cassettes and CD's are different each time I hear them. Ever new and ever changing even as he has now passed on. That is true greatness.

Seeing India's present musical awareness, I think that in a way, it is better that he died. For he is now with the gods. And they are his fitting audience.

I will not miss you Khansaheb - you are in my heart.

I'm an Indian (Mac Hack)

I'm very thrilled today. I finally had the time and energy to do something that I had been wanting to for a long time but putting off. But I suppose its no use for you reading any further unless you own a Mac. Or a Hackintosh.

What I had wanted to do was change the flag in the menubar input source icon to the Tricolour. It was depressing have to stare at the Stars and Stripes or the Union Jack. The Tricolour isn't available in the International Sysytem Preferences.

This is what it looks like now.

Here's a short tutorial in case you have ever wanted to do the same - or want to do it now.

Download Ukelele from http://scripts.sil.org/cms/scripts/page.php?site_id=nrsi&id=Ukelele. Ukelele is a Keyboard Layout Editor for Mac OS X.

Make a folder called Ukelele in the Applications folder and move all the files and directories from the mounted dmg to here.

Start Ukelele and select "Copy of other layout". Select Applications -> Ukelele -> System Keyboards -> Roman -> U.S..keylayout

Then do Save As and name it Indian.keylayout and save to ~/Library/Keyboard Layouts/. You have a brand new keyboard layout. But you still have to associate a flag icon with this.

Download this and copy to ~/Library/Keyboard Layouts/. Don't change the name. Or if you do, remember that the .keylayout and .icns file need to have the same primary name.

(If you need the flag of another country then download the flag in a graphic format and use Img2icns to do the conversion.)

Log out. Log in. You're good to go.

Bless You

I recently completed a course from the Art of Living entitled the Blessing/Healing Course. I am now authorised to bless/heal anyone having any problems - physical, mental or anything else. To be more accurate, I cannot really bless or heal, but attempt to channelise Guruji's power.

(If you are in the dark about either Guruji or the Art of Living you can use Google, because otherwise it would take a separate blog entry.)

I provide no guarantees as I don't understand a thing about how it works or when. But if you are in trouble you can ask me for help. I'll do my best. If you know me personally you can send in an e-mail or call me or accost me somewhere.

If you don't know me, you can still e-mail me. I'll see if anything can be done.

And oh yes, you don't have to believe a word of this for this to work. :-)

Just ask. You have nothing to lose.

Ustad Zakir Hussain, Me and Mayukh

If there is one sound that I could recognise while asleep, it would be the sound of Zakir's tabla. (I've irreverently called him by his first name for years.) In a strange twist of fate I had forgotten what it was like. To listen to him live. I had forgotten the fidgety, noisy audience before the curtain went up.

As I sat through his concert again, I remembered everything.

What the air smelt like, (perfumed and unlike Calcutta), the red-velvet chairs of the VIP's, the rich, the famous (all of whom would fall asleep in a short while), people trying to get noticed (by hand-shaking the red-velvet occupants from behind) - all very vivid.

The local musicians were all back-stage. (Mind you, when a Calcuttan refers to "local musicians", he refers to the best Classical talent the country has produced.) They were backstage because they wanted to talk to Zakir and let the world know that they were on talking terms with him. Normally, I would give and arm and a leg to be able to touch their feet, but today I wanted to be alone. Because today was the day that I heard that sound again.

I hated the crowd. I more than mildly hoped that I could wish them away so that I could be alone with him. OK, a few of the other genuine music lovers could possibly be admitted. Of course, I was the only person in the universe who understood his music. But the sleep-ers, the noisy, the rag-tag should definitely be shown the door. The "rag-tag" is used derisively but it it has no implications on social status and oddly enough, none on classical training or comprehension either.

I met Mayukh at St. Xavier's. I had a bit of an ego then because I could play the tabla fairly well and I think that he had an ego too and for exactly the same reason. We regarded each other with suspicion...

...till we discovered that we were both Zakir Hussain devotees. All was forgiven and we shook hands and made up. We spent time at each others' houses listening to Zakir's tapes and admiring his artistry. Eventually, we started practising together.

The wait for the curtain was getting unbearable. What made it more agonising was that you could hear Zakir tuning his tabla backstage.

The great Peavey's crackle to life. The crowd shifts and sits upright in anticipation of the announcement. With the introductions over the curtain goes up slowly to a mild mechanical whirring.

The suppressed hysteria finds vent. People stand up and cheer and clap and whistle and yell. Zakir has to quieten them down after thirty seconds.

The crowd is silent. Zakir signals to the sarangi and the heart-wrenching notes of the sarangi get added to the tanpura drone. The stage is set.

One cycle goes by. I wait for the life giving water. Zakir sits with eyes closed and hands on the tabla. As the sum is about to arrive, he suddenly awakens. There is a brief flash of his right index finger. It hits the kinaar in a single fulfilling stroke. Then silence again.

I drink in the perfection of the stroke. The tone is rich and full - I've never heard that in any other tabla player. The bol fills every nook and cranny of the auditorium. It permeates my being. My soul is full. The Ustad is ready. I am ready.

Eyes closed, I listen to the languorous peshkaar meandering its way through the sixteen beats. Unhurried, the Ustad plays. The perfection is all I can think of. Every strike is beautiful. What they create together is even more so. There is no flaw. He is doing stuff which under any other circumstance I would disbelieve. But now I cannot.

After 10 minutes we are still in ati-vilambit. My body strains and contorts as the rhythmic patterns get more expansive and elaborate. Its almost as if I fear that he is going to miss the sum this time - but he reminds you every time that while you are lost in his music, he is completely aware of the Beauty.

I wish the peshkaar would go on forever. 20 minutes down, not a single pattern has been repeated. It is new every time and makes you want more.

The relaxed rhythmic expressions are giving way to short bursts of impossible speed. What is amazing is that the tonal quality and fullness come through unhindered. I know at once why I worship him.

One thing that Mayukh and I hated the most was the crowd hysteria in St. Xavier's over western music. People loved the school band. They whistled and clapped when they sang and drummed. And they boo-ed and jeered at Classical numbers.

We decided we would take the risk of our lives. Next Teacher's Day, when the students put up numbers for the faculty, we would join in. We enlisted as "Classical Tabla Duet" to raised eyebrows and smothered smirks.

On that fateful day in September, as the curtain went up we gulped. There were at least one million people in the auditorium. We were dwarfed in their presence. We couldn't see anything because of the lights on us. The world seemed like a black hole.

Our stomachs swimming, we stammered to the audience to give us a chance. They did and fell silent. We remembered Zakir in our minds, did a low five and started...

The qaidas take over. My disappointment at the peshkaar getting over is soon overcome. Zakir's left hand is doing things on the bnaya which makes the audience go crazy. I am hoping that they won't break out into foolish clapping and spoil it for me. They do.

Zakir's hands begin to look motorised. They are spewing out intricate improvisations. I watch open mouthed. He is smiling and has his eyes fixed in space over the audience's heads. I realise he is connected to a source of Beauty that I can only appreciate, but not see. He sways mildly and head-bangs vigorously. His fingers are a blur. But I can still hear each stroke. That same room-filling and soul-filling sound. There is no sacrifice of Classical integrity. He is doing undocumented stuff. But they are augmenting the integrity and reinforcing it.

The audience is hysteric, they don't know what to do. They don't see it as lucidly as I do, but they know that something is going on. The creative process eludes them. I see it. Zakir doesn't. For he is possibly unaware of what he is doing. There is a spontaneity rising from within him and his fingers are merely reacting in expression. He is oblivious that he is doing something incredible. He is doing it because it is flowing through him. For him, it is neither incredulous nor impossible. For he personifies something beyond judgement right now.

The resounding crash of the sum brings me out of the trance. The audience erupts. They feel the need for expression. Poor souls! If only they could see what I saw, they would not clap. Clapping is demeaning to the Beauty. Would you clap at a beautiful sunset? Would you clap at a garden in spring bloom? Would you clap at a Kalbaishakhi? Why do you clap now? If you can see true Beauty, you will be unable to react.

Mayukh and I became instant celebrities in school. We were heroes. Even the teachers looked at us starry-eyed. That was the confidence boost we needed. All of a sudden we were revered musicians.

Academics took the back burner. Zakir and the tabla were all we could think of. We sat on the same bench in class planning our next show. We were so lost that we often started drumming on the desk and had to be hauled up by the teacher. But celebrities are usually let off with mild chastisements...

We were on a roll after that. When some music school came on a lecture tour to St. Xavier's and starting acting too smart, Mayukh and I were called in (by the teachers believe it or not) to put them in their place. We did. When some Western Classical musicians came visiting St. Xavier's, we were asked to play at a private concert for them. We did.

But the icing on the cake came on Prize Distribution Day. The school band always performed on Prize Distribution - it was the norm. But that year, Father Headmaster and Father Prefect asked Mayukh and me to play on Prize Distribution Day.

Parents came up after the concert and asked us who we learnt from. We wanted to say Zakir Hussain, but kept quiet and smiled politely. But really, that is what either of us wanted to do. We were sick of having to imitate him. We harboured dreams of one day studying the tabla at his feet...

I lost touch with Mayukh 15 years ago when I moved to a different city to pursue my engineering degree.

Its been an hour. Ustadji shifts to madhyam Teentaal. There is a change in mood. A certain light-heartedness as he recites bols, attaches funny stories to them and plays them (immaculately). The audience takes in the stories very amused. Clever Zakir. While the stories are for the rag-tag, the bol's are for the the connossieur. One never knows the dividing line.

Blitzkrieg after blitzkrieg they arrive. I have been away from him for too long.

I reminisced about how when 7 years old, I had increased my daily tabla practice time from 10 minutes to 45 minutes on hearing my first live concert - Ustad Alla Rakha Khansaheb with his worthy son in jugalbandi. I had hated the monotony of the tabla till then and my parents had given up hope in those one and a half years.

After that concert, my parents had to deal with a completely different devil. By the time I was 10 years old, I could effortlessly do around two hours. My parents were proud I think. Till I reached the 8th class, they remained proud. Then they realised that something was wrong. My friends were joining tuition classes and I was locking myself up in a room for steadily increasing times. I was listening to Zakir tapes, rewinding them. I must have seen 100 live concerts of him by then and my parents had always been very supportive.

But when I reached my 9th they weren't any more. My friends could solve complex engineering problems already whereas I didn't display the slightest interest in them. I was practising for 7 to 8 hours daily and doing it without flinching. I was seeing within myself a love so great that I couldn't stay away. I played the tabla for hours. In my mind's eye, I saw Ustad Zakir Hussain and I wanted to be able to play like him. I analysed and corrected my music in a mental comparison with him...

I am jolted out of my reverie. Ustad Zakir Hussain has just fumbled on stage. Of course, I was the only person who knew it. I look up at him amused.

For a split second he looks befuddled. Then he goes berserk. I see what he is doing. He is making it up to everyone. His drumming starts to reach an alarming volume. A volume which seems like it will hurt the ears but actually doesn't. Even at this volume, he barely lifts his hands. I grip my seat handles bracing for impact. I know I am going to witness something I will cherish forever. Only, I don't know what it is going to be.

Zakir is saying sorry and vindicating himself at the same time. His entire body stiffens. The drumming has become spectacular. The volume is high and unwavering. The bnaya adds thunderous bass. The speed is frightening. The auditorium is reverberating. You feel scared. The audience dares not make a noise. For we witness naad-brahma.

Do you know what this is like? It is like the feeling you would get at the moment of bungee-jumping off a cliff. It is the feeling you get when India gets a wicket in the dying overs of a cliffhanger. Only - this carries on and on. You have never experienced this before. Every nerve and sinew in your body is bursting with the rush of emotions, the high point of emotions. Yet this doesn't pass like it would when you actually bungee-jump or you actually celebrate the wicket.

Zakir has hit the pause button for the rest of the world. I am suspended in time, waiting to scream out in release. But he drums on. Same volume, same bass, same speed - unfaltering and unwavering. I begin to sweat. I think I will cry because I cannot take it any longer. I have never experienced so much Beauty.

One and a half minutes later, he releases me from my temporal imprisonment. I cover my face with my hands. Thank you God for having put me on Earth in the same time as this genius. Does Zakir look at me and smile? I am not sure. He is pretending that nothing ever happened.

1 hour 45 minutes, the concert is drawing to a close. Ustadji's rela's come out thick and fast and little mellow - adding perfect contrast to what just transpired. The sound is still perfect - as if he just started. There are thin streams of perspiration down the side of his cheeks. He changes from one pattern to another. There is one person in the whole world who can keep playing without loss of tonal integrity after almost 2 hours of solid percussion - and that is Ustad Zakir Hussain. Over and over, he defies limits imposed by mere human muscles and tissues.

Again there is a rumbling from his tabla. Another storm is coming. I am familiar with this one. It is the grand climax. Ustad Zakir Hussain is pumping out 32 strokes per second and I can hear each and every one of them. Foolish people start clapping again. Any moment now, I think.

Tihai part one, tihai part two, tihai part three. Crash, bang, and then boom and sum collide in an impossible flurry of hits. Zakir gets up, thanks the audience like he had just had a cup of tea with them and melts away back stage. Everyone runs after him and the police are forced to form a barricade.

If there is something that I wanted to do very badly, it was to learn the tabla from Ustad Zakir Hussain. It had been my dream. Of course, now I will be too ashamed to even tell him that I once played the tabla.

Mayukh and I enjoyed a friendly rivalry over Zakir Hussain. At his concerts, we would try to outdo each other at how close we could get to him. Sometimes, we would manage to exchange a few words with the Ustad after the concert and then decide who he spoke more to.

Once, I beat Mayukh convincingly at the game. Zakir was playing with my (sarod) guru (Aashish Khan) and much to Guruji's dislike, I sneaked up behind him and sat on stage. Mayukh watched dismally from the audience. After the show, I rubbed it in but telling him how it felt like an earthquake when Zakir set off.

Mayukh however, had the last laugh. I got in touch with him last month after 15 years at a chance meeting. He has become a professional tabla player.

And he rubbed it in when he told me that he was learning the tabla from Ustad Zakir Hussain...

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Zakir's photo I took at a concert backstage and later had it autographed by him at another concert. Was lucky to have caught him in that pose...

Mayukh in blue and me in red. Sometimes I played the sarod, but mostly it was the tabla. This snap was taken when the Western musicians came visiting. We did play the tabla duet as the grand finale...