Khamaj light on art’s meaning

AHMEDABAD: "Helloooooo”, sang Pandit Ajoy Chakrabarty, testing the microphone on Friday, Saptak Day 4. “Thoda volume bada karoooo,” he continued, giving the sound engineers practical advice and poetic direction. So Pandit Chakrabarty — the grandee of the Patiala-Kasur Gharana — made the audience feel part of a dialogue on technicalities even before the recital. The audience’s laughter rose like a surge of heat against the 11.30pm chill.
The stirrings of a dialogue set the tone for Panditji’s exposition of Raga Khamaj.In his opening remarks, he said he had suggested to Saptak organizers that they initiate question-and-answer sessions between artists and rasikas in future editions. The audience cheered. Panditji’s renown is built by his sovereign command of art and his voice that plumbs endless depths like a philosophical inquiry. Panditji is like the philosopher who makes his students comfortable in the classroom before delivering a lecture on their place in the universe.
“I chose Khamaj because khayals are not usually rendered in it,” Panditji told TOI. “It is usually chosen for thumris.” Khayal (imagination) is the improvisational soul of raga explication. Thumri is considered a lighter form, sustaining such themes as romance and devotion. The Khamaj incense suffuses Bapu’s favourite song of salvation, “Vaishnav Jan To”. On Friday, Panditji’s essay brought out devotion’s calmness as well as the ebullience of the believer whose prayer has been answered.
Panditji not only took up the challenge to persuade a khayal to see the felicity of Khamaj but also dealt with the enchanting complication of defining a raga. “Raga is painting on atmospheric air through the air we breathe,” Panditji told TOI. His scholarly succinctness comes from his success as a guest lecturer at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Stanford, among other US institutions. “I am recording 100 ragas for IIT-Kharagpur for scientific analysis, a first in India,” he said. Science and art: that promises to be a tremendous raga.