The Manganiyar Seduction at the Purana Quila

Last Sunday, Delhi was witness to an amazing event - The Manganiyar Seduction conceived and directed by Roysten Abel. First created for the Osians to open the film festival in Delhi 2006, the show has since travelled the world, performing at Festivals in Sydney, Singapore, Holland, Dublin, London, France and at the Lincoln Center in New York last week before returning to India

The set is a vertical construction of 4 rows of 9 cubicles each lit up by tiny lights and covered with curtains. The curtain opens just before a performer makes his appearance in the piece and the lights turn on each time he performs, creating a wonderful visual spectacle to go with the music. The set up is influenced by the Hawa Mahal in Jaipur and the Red Light Districts of Amsterdam.This awe inspiring set is 3500kgs of solid wood and metal that takes a crew of 8 around 6 hours to set up.

The Manganiyars are a community of Muslim court musicians who hail from villages around Jaisalmer, Jodhpur and Barmer. Their repertoire ranges from ballads about the kings to Sufi songs written by various mystics. And their music is a synthesis of folk music, Sufi music and Indian classical music.

The instruments played in this performance include the sarangi (considered the most difficult Indian instrument), been, khartal, kamancha, algoza and morchang among others

The performance is absolutely mind blowing. The range of instruments, the symphony, the collaboration and not a sheet of music in sight. This is one of those experiences, that if ytou have the fortune of witnessing it live, it will remian embedded in your mind and heart forever. JT - a wise friend of mine, who was also here, said " performances like these, remind us that any display of devotion other than music, seems so shallow in comparison"

 

The performers are all grounded in reality and go back to till their lands between performances. Abel attributes this to their past when they performed for royalty and then went back to their own homes. The group faces its own sets of problems when travelling. In their last trip to the US, they were 42 Khans in the group and 6 got held back for "special" questioning, their performer visas not withstanding, when they were asked to spell their mothers names in English. A tough job for the performers who barely understand English. But they persevere just for their music. And people like me are blessed to witness a performance in our lifetime.

Take a sneak peek at the videos here:

If you are impressed with what you see, then do consider buying the CD or LP from Amarrass Records who has created a non profit initiative - the Amarrass Society to help provide such traditional musicians and musical instrument makers with a sustainable livelihood which will eliminate their need to head to city and give up their traditional crafts. The CD is 500Rs and half the profit goes back to benefit the musicians and the craftsmen who supply their instruments. The Amarrass Society plans to also sell some of the instruments online giving the craftsmen a wider market than possible in their villages (many such craftsmen have migrated to the city to make furniture, forgoing their skills with instruments)

Jaipur Literature Festival - Nine Lives Readings & Performances

23 January 2010

This was a sun down program. While the rest of Jaipur was dry for some elections/rally (or some other political reason), permissions had been got at the Diggi Palace to provide liquid fortification to the attendees and authors.

The evening started with Readings and Performances from William Dalrymple's Nine Lives: In Search of the Sacred in Modern India

The readings were interspersed with vocals by Paban Das Baul and Kanai Das Baul & Debdas Baul. The latter two being the main protagonists of the 9th tale - The Song of the Blind Ministrel

The words, the lyrics, the chanting, the atmosphere, the crowd, the open air seating all just combined to make this a mesmerising and magical evening.

There was more to come. Susheela Raman - a British Tamil Musician came on stage to perform with Sam Mills
, Nathoo Lal Solanki and Chugee Khan. The music was absolutely out of this world. This is true World Music. Tamil classical raagas sundg with a stong husky voice, jazzed up with rock and other beats. Its a CD worth buying.

This picture was taken in the afternoon while they were reheasing. In the evening, we lost ourselves in the music and completely forgot to take pictures!

                

Penguin Spring Fever - Trickster City

Today was a fitting finale to the Penguin Spring Fever celebrations. This evenings program encapsulated everything that the festival stood for. The theme for this finale was  - Discover the uniqueness of Delhi
To start off the evening, was the recent release "Trickster City". Shveta Sarda is the translator of this unique anthology whose stories have been written by a group of 20 somethings who live in neighbourhoods like LNJP colony, Dakshinapuri and Sawda-Ghevra in Delhi. What is unique about this collection is that it gives voices to stories which otherwise may have just been statistics in a social workers register. Neelofar, one of the writers and Shveta alternated reading passages from the book in English and Hindi and had the audience spellbound. I've read some of the stories from the book (they are short stories) and will review it when I'm done. But this is definitely a must-read.

Sam Miller then read an excerpt from his last years release "Delhi: Adventures in a Megacity". Sam Miller was a BBC correspondent in Delhi in the early 1990's. He has returned and lived in Delhi since 2002. His book is more about Delhi as seen through his eyes while he walked about the city.

William Dalrymple, then read from his novels set in Delhi. "City of Djinns" and "The Last Mughal" effectively tying up the Delhi of Millers book to the Delhi portrayed in Mahmood Farooqui's upcoming book. What can I say about him? He is an author who always has his audience eating out of the palm of his hand!

 


The last reading for the day was by Mahmood Farooqui and Danish Husain from Mahmoood's yet to be released "Besieged: Voices from Delhi 1857" It was a pleasure to see the two of them in action again. Its been almost 4 years since I last saw them perform in Bombay. While todays reading was not half as flamboyant, (You have to try and watch a Dastangoi performance at least once in your lifetime, they are next performing in Pune on April 12th) it was very illuminating. Mahmood has been researching papers at the National Archives and his book attempts to explain 1857 through the voices of the common man rather than the parroted lines in History text books. The book is a collection of translations of letters of various people during the time of the uprising and seige on Delhi. There are letters from butchers, hawaldars, thanedars and the like. We could have listened to the 2 of them all night.

The audience who had foregone the IPL, Liverpool-ManU & Navroze celebrations, to be here, was completely spell bound.

A beautiful end to the evening was the 2 hour Qawwali performance by the Nizami Brothers. Ghulam Sabir and Ghulam Waris. They performed the traditional qawwals and sang about national unity and integration among other traditional themes.

Listening to a performance like this can truly put you into a spiritual trance if you stop trying to control your mind, close your eyes and just go with the flow. the little kids who are training to be qawwalis gave us a short performance and there was so much potential there. The eldest of the 3 boys already has remarkable control over his voice for his age and they are sure to take this performance art further.

Wonderful evening, beautiful memories. Waiting for the next literature festival now.

Penguin Spring Fever - Thank God It’s Friday!

It was advertised as an evening of fun and music and it certainly delivered what it promised.

The live band was awesome! They played old English numbers, that you rarely get to hear nowadays except in some peoples homes. It took me back to my childhood impromptu singalongs whenever friends and family got together.

Some senior members in the crowd took the lead and hit the dancefloor prompting the younger ones to join in too.

Absolut had sponsored the evening. What a time to be off alcohol :( LOL. But it was fun with just a glass of Pepsi too.