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.