Lekker

Hmmm :-) and more to come

Glimpse of Heaven

Another magical event came to be on Saturday night. The Santoor combined in divine fashion with the Tabla to create magic like we don't experience but for a few brief instances in our lives. Pandit Shiv Kumar Sharma and Ustad Zakir Hussain played together. An incredible 3 hour performance which left one weak and exhausted...the only word I guess to describe the experience is celestial. As an Indian, I can only say I must have been very, very good in previous births to have seen something like this, that after seeing Remember Shakti last year.

Celestial.

Out of body experience

"Dude, there's a concert on this evening. You're on right?...Good good."

And yet again thanks to Pablo, I was mesmerized, held in thrall & transported to another world. A world of melody, romance, soul, colours and so many other emotions & feelings. Irshad Khan played with just 50 of us sitting in rapt attention, about 10 feet away from the maestro. And in this case, the tag maestro well & truly doesn't do justice. He is the nephew of the late great Ustad Vilayat Khan, one of the 2 contemporary pioneers of the Sitar along with Pandit Ravi Shankar.



The concert was originally scheduled for 2 hours but with a little coaxing from the audience, Khan-saab played on for an incredible 3 1/2 hours with just a 15 minute break in between. What made this concert special was his unique blend of sitar & vocals, an unexplainably beautiful thumri, select compositions, some of which date back 400 years & best of all, a performance on the Surbahar: a unique bass sitar. The first concert of 2007...and it'll take a lot to match this one. Shakti, Ustad Shahid Parvez and now Irshad Khan...I am truly blessed.