Ravi and Guru Purnima

Every year on Guru Purnima day, the students of the noted violinist Pandita Supriya Pathak gather at her home to perform in her honour on this momentous day.

The Pandita is very particular that all of her students should perform on that day. But then she also expects everyone to practise and rehearse so thoroughly that they give as close to a flawless performance as possible. When her students perform she sits close to them and listens to them very minutely. Mediocrity is frowned upon, and she would rather a student completely drops out from performing than render a shoddy performance on this great day. 

Ravi, who has been studying with her for the last 4 years dreads this particular day. Ravi is a self taught violinist who wanted to become a better violinist after his early retirement from his corporate career. So when he heard that the Pandita has finally started offering online classes he joined her online classes with great enthusiasm. He was already playing confidently in a small local band, and he imagined that learning under the Pandita will make him a more refined player which will enable him to join a bigger band. 

However, soon after he joined the online class, Ravi realised he has bitten off more than he can chew. Firstly the Pandita told him that he had to unlearn a lot because he was using wrong bowing techniques. Secondly he had never learnt music in a formal manner so he did not understand anything about notating and scales. He belonged to a group who had all studied some music formally so he became the odd student in his online group who could not comprehend what was being discussed in the class. Finally, he realised that learning to play violin online was very difficult as some of the wrist movements and bowing techniques require a lot of sensitivity, and this was difficult to teach/learn using an online format. 

Consequently he started dreading the weekly violin classes as every class was sheer struggle. Earlier he used to play the violin for the sheer joy of playing it, but now he stopped playing it for enjoyment - nowadays he plays it only to finish the homework assignment that the Pandita gave every week. 

The Pandita is a very encouraging and dedicated Guru, but how can he keep telling the Pandita that much of what she says in the group class just flies over his head? And the Pandita had the habit of mentioning names of her brilliant students in her class and narrate how well they were progressing, and how quick they were in comprehending. For Ravi, this subtly meant that he had to compare himself with the bright students in the class - all of whom were less than half his age and who were all talented and aspiring professional musicians.  The comparison element made the fun element disappear in music, and even though Ravi was competitive in his corporate career he disliked comparisons because he had left his career to discover his own path. 

So with Guri Purnima approaching Ravi started feeling a deep dread even when he is sleeping. He took the help of a musician friend to figure out what to play and organised the script, and practised like crazy for the next 1 month.

On Guru Purnima a procession of the Pandita's students performed, each better than the previous. Ravi's turn was next and the cold dread again started, and he cursed himself for being in a situation where he felt that some 60 experts (all the Pundita's disciples) were evaluating him and passing judgement over him. 

His fingers were clammy, and the accompanying tabla player got into a faster rhythm than Ravi could manage comfortably. Yet he played as best as he could, and was glad when he played out the last line of his piece without too many errors.

He knew he could have done a better job - but somehow the stress got into him - and he fails when there is no joy.  His peers from the online batch told him he played well, but he felt they were saying it merely to make him feel better about himself. 

"There is pain in learning anything new - but is this level of pain not crossing my threshold? Is all this stress worth it - and for what purpose if I have stopped enjoying playing the violin?" he asked himself as he went to bed that night. 

The Disciple Who Won Despite Losing

The King had organised a competition among all the potters in his land to identify who is the best potter amongst all. All the master potters and their disciples were eligible to participate and submit their best entry in the form of a drinking cistern.

In a small dilapidated hut, the master potter and his favourite disciple were both at work, each crafting their respective Cisterns. The master potter belonged to a particular school of pottery which embellished their work with a technique called Shimmering which gave a glazed feel to the final product. The master potter was proud of his unique technique and had asked his best disciple to also participate in this competition so that at least one of them would win the competition, and do the technique proud.  

The disciple casually looked at the Master giving the finishing touches to his masterpiece. His Master's piece was really superb - crafted in the traditional design, and - with the finishing touches the master was giving, it was acquiring a shimmer that none others can create. It was his master's trade mark style that he taught only his most favourite disciples.

The Disciple then looked at his own unfinished creation - it also looked good - after all his master had trained him really well. Then he wondered how should he give the finishing touches. Should he give it the shimmer that his master prefers, or should he do something very different from what his master has trained him to do?

His love for his master made him hesitate.

Ultimately the disciple decided to do something different and finished his cistern using a new technique that came to his mind at that moment. 

The master's entry won the competition easily. The master felt happy that he is still the best Potter in the land. Then the master looked at his disciple's entry and started to chide him for forgetting the lessons he had been taught. The disciple looked distraught but kept silent. Then the master stopped scolding as it suddenly dawned on him as to why his favourite disciple had disobeyed him for the 1st ever time.

The master looked at his disciple and thought "Only a true Guru and a true disciple will figure out why my favourite disciple behaved the way he did. My disciple is a better person than I am - he has more faith in me than I myself. He is my worthy successor and from now on whatever knowledge I have is his".

The benefits of a fat wallet

When UPI was introduced, the size of my wallet visibly shrunk. I stopped carrying much currency notes, and the wallet was basically for only carrying my various ID cards and ATM cards.

When I travel I make an exception as most of my travel happens by train and it is necessary to have notes of small denomination (RS 10, 20, 50 etc) always available. This however results in a rather bulky sized wallet which I dislike as it ruins my dapper good looks by its ungainly bulge from my back pocket.

However, I realized the benefit of a bulging wallet yesterday when walking on a rain drenched passage I took a major tumble and landed on my back with a big thud. 

Serious damage would have certainly resulted to my hind-side but for the cushion that the bulky wallet provided as it absorbed the bulk of the impact.

I won't curse fat wallets any more - even if it is seriously ruining my good looks.

Karma - and why the world is round

It is close to bed time and I am lying on the bed after a hectic day. I am feeling a bit peckish and am munching some cashew nuts from a big box of dry fruits that my daughter gifted me.

I am feeling it is Karma. I used to regularly gift my mother packets of dry fruits. For me it seemed like a small gesture, and I never used to understand why her face used to light up with happiness whenever I gave her the dry fruits. Now while munching the dry fruits my daughter gave me, I know the reason. It is not as if I cannot buy it myself - I can buy stuff anytime (though I rarely do - my parsimonious nature does not allow me to buy anything "indulging" for myself). 

The happiness is because it is the thought that counts - the love that gets shown through simple gestures from your loved ones. And anything prepared or given with love always tastes so wonderful. 

Bless all those who give only from love.

Scintillating Notes of a Harmonist

My name is Virat Sharma, and I am a harmonium artiste in the town of Malpuri.  Until recently this town had only 2 reputed harmonium artistes.  Both of them were getting old and over-worked, so it must have been a relief to them when I, a young artiste with modern ideas, decided to offer my newly honed harmonium skills to this town.  So now there are 3 reputed harmonium artistes in this town.

As you know I share my first name with a legendary cricketer - so it is not surprisingly my fans call me Virat Kohli of Music. Right from childhood I wanted to be a famous cricketer with crowds applauding my batting, but destiny made me a musician. 

But so be it, I have shaped my harmonium playing style after my namesake legendry cricketer - and try to bring the same entertaining spirit into raag music.  When I am accompanying someone on the harmonium, I visualise how Virat Kohli would have faced a ball and hit it for a 4 - and I then hit a particular musical phrase out of the auditorium for a 6.  The audience obviously love it when I bring some excitement - so I keenly wait for such opportunities.

Today, for instance, I was accompanying 2 lady vocalists at a concert.  In the audience I can see some VIPs and I acknowledged their presence.

The lady in blue saree (blue lady) started her Nat-Bhairav alaap.  Ah, this is a raag that is very familiar to me - so it is a great start for me.  The blue lady's voice was a bit soft, but I more than made up for it by playing my harmonium loudly so that the audience can clearly make out what raag she is singing.  For some strange reason, the lady started gesturing to the sound engineer that the harmonium sound should be reduced - but fortunately the sound engineer was too busy looking at his mobile phone so he did nothing.  In any case, I am always prepared for such eventuality - and ensure that my harmonium has a loud and clear sound so that the last row audience can hear and appreciate the harmonium clearly even without a mike.

Then the lady in pink saree (pink lady) joined in the jugalbandi.  This pink lady does not seem to have practised because her voice was feeble, seemed to lack self-confidence and she was leaving a lot of space between phrases.  I don't believe in leaving a lot of empty space, so I made it a point of filling up all the spaces with a lot of new phrases that I had recently learnt.  The audience should get value for their money, and we should give them as much music as possible - all these leaving lots of empty space while singing is just a waste of audience time.

I was getting a bit irritated with this unenergetic pink lady.  We might bore the audience this way.  When it was time for her to get into the anthra I thought she had forgotten the anthra so I helped her by starting the anthra for her (I know 2500 bandishes).  

The next item was a raagmalika, which is a complex piece with a different raag for each line.  I have not heard this particular raagmalika but that is not a problem as I can play any raag.  In the 1st para they sang Jayjayvanthi and Rageshri.  I quickly found a gap and played a stirring piece on the harmonium.  And I innovated by introducing Bageshri into the mix so that the audience can enjoy. The audience really appreciated and said "Wah wah".

The next piece was a Miya Malhar.  The blue lady started on her taans (fast melodic phrases).  Now here is where I am different from other harmonium artistes.  Other harmonium artistes will be quiet and only echo the ending part of each taan. But my style is new and different.  When the lady sings a taan I simultaneously play another taan (of course of the same raag) on my harmonium. So the audience gets to simultaneously enjoy 2 different taans at the same time.  I think I hit a big 6 on this, and so I looked at the 1st row VIP audience meaningfully - and they applauded.  I really love this very appreciative and knowledgeable audience.

Now they started singing a song which reflects the different seasons.  They started off with the summer season piece which was good because it was very energetic.  But by the time the piece reached the winter season, they seemed to have again lost their energy and there was too much of weakness and melancholy in their voice and I could barely hear them.  But I again made up for their lack of energy by playing some fast bright energetic notes and filling the concert hall with a scintillating display of my dexterity on the keys.

Of course the strain of me single-handedly holding up the concert did get to me at times - and on a couple of occasions I did fumble.  I wondered whether I should touch my ear to acknowledge the error like some of those oldies do - but then I decided not to.  Why draw audience attention to a mistake which they do not seem to have noticed?  

Finally we reached the end of the concert.  Both the ladies seemed tired and confused.  The tabla player too looked defeated - initially he tried to compete with me by unnecessarily trying some fast thekas and playing the tabla loudly; but towards the end he realised he did not have my experience - and humbly gave me full control.  I am glad he did that - all artistes should learn to be humble - that is what my Guru always says.

Overall, it was another good day for me, and I am so happy and proud that the audience can now go home content and happy.  For me, the audience is God, and knowing that I had made a difference today to the audience was the most fulfilling aspect of my day.