Dhwani Academy of Percussion Music organised a Taal Vadya Utsav in the memory of Guru Jnan Prakash Ghosh at the Vivekananda Hall of the Ramakrishna Mission Institute of Culture, Golpark. The event began with a percussion ensemble performance by the students of Dhwani Academy conducted by Abhijit Banerjee and Somnath Roy. This was followed by a recital by Arup Chattopadhyay of the Farrukhabad gharana. He started his performance with an 11-beat progression called ‘Chaar taal ki sawari’. He was absorbed in the rhythmic presentation and played uthan, peshkaar, khanda jati, kaidas and tukras in teentaal. He concluded his performance with chakradhars and was ably accompanied by Gourab Chatterjee on the harmonium.
The final performance on the first day was a scintillating tabla solo by Yogesh Samsi. The maestro commenced his performance with peshkaar and continued with kaidas and relas in madhyalay teentaal. He played old and famous compositions from the Punjab gharana as well as those by Haji Vilayat Khan as a tribute to the maestros of Farrukhabad. Samsi ended his tabla solo in drut teentaal with tukdas, gats and chakradhar in khanda jati and mishra jati. He was assisted beautifully on the harmonium by Hiranmay Mitra. Samsi’s spontaneity and fluency, even in the difficult compositions, made his performance enchanting.
The second day began with an Odissi recital by Ratikant Mohapatra and his troupe of dancers and musicians. Mohapatra opened with a solo rendition of Ramastuti, followed by pallavi by three of his students with Mohapatra playing the mardala. They completed the cycle with Shabarir Pratiksha from Ramcharitmanas. The artist was poised and calm throughout the presentation. The winner of the Jnan Prakash Ghosh Memorial Global Tabla Competition, Anirudh Sharma, played the pakhawaj in aditaal and was perfectly supported by Rajendra Prasad Banerjee on the harmonium. The audience also enjoyed the tabla solo by Arvind Kumar Azad from the Benaras gharana; he presented teentaal as well as some signature beats of the Benaras gharana composed and popularised by the tabla exponent, Bhairav Sahay. Hiranmay Mitra displayed his excellence with the melody of his harmonium.
A presentation at Taal Vadya Utsav. [Source: Dhwani Academy of Percussion Music]
The duet by Abhijit Banerjee on the tabla and Suresh Vaidyanathan on the ghatam with Hiranmay Mitra on the harmonium was one of the key attractions of the festival. Both the artists enthralled the audience with the resonating beats of madhyalay teentaal and aditaal in South Indian classical music. The concluding part of the performance was a piece, Dusk, set to nine beats in Raga Shree where both the artists played with Lars Møller on the saxophone, Snehashish Mozumder on the mandolin and Somnath Roy on percussion.
The finale of the Taal Vadya Utsav was grand and captivating with a recital by Akram Khan with Rajendra Prasad Banerjee on the harmonium. Khan commenced his performance with peshkaar and wonderfully captured the essence of the Ajrara gharana from which he hails. He portrayed the intricacies of the Delhi gharana as well, escalating his performance to the next level with drut teentaal, playing compositions from Ajrara, Punjab and other gharanas and bringing the festival to a perfect conclusion.
