Hindustani and Carnatic styles from across the country will converge at a rare showcase in Worli, featuring maestros and young talent
Anand Bhate will bring his Hindustani classical expertise to the event
Like most musical families, Srikrishna and Ramkumar Mohan started young under the tutelage of their father Trichur R Mohan, a veteran mridangam player. Like most Indian families, the brothers — now popular as the Trichur Brothers — had to crack a competitive exam nonetheless. The chartered accountants-cum-Carnatic vocalists will now tally their tunes with Hindustani vocalist Anand Bhate among other familiar names like Manganiyar vocalist Kachra Khan and santoor player Rahul Sharma this weekend.
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We open our conversation by getting a pressing question out of the way — which one of the two professional pursuits could have possibly been tougher to crack? “Even though music ran in the family, it was never imposed on us. Chartered accountancy, on the other hand, was a purely materialistic goal that we had to get out of the way,” Srikrishna laughs. The vocalist remembers waking up to Carnatic tunes playing in the family home and joining the riyaz out of curiosity. “It was possibly this freedom that we were allowed in a structured practice such as Carnatic music, that made it the easier pursuit,” he admits.
Srikrishna and Ramkumar Mohan perform in the USA earlier this year
Growing up in the 1990s taking inspiration from another maestro — AR Rahman — the duo is evidently not a stickler for orthodoxy. “It shows in our music,” Ramkumar agrees, adding, “We were never trained in the art of presentation. So, when we took the stage, we experimented to find our style.” Today, the duo is recognised for its fresh take on duet singing, where both vocalists harmonise onstage, contrary to the longstanding practice of a relay-style jugalbandi. “We didn’t know we were breaking a tradition. It garnered some criticism from purists initially, but they warmed up to our style with time,” Ramkumar reveals.
The brothers will take stage with Pune-based National Award-winning vocalist Anand Bhate, whose memories of training under the great Indian vocalist late Pandit Bhimsen Joshi paint a similar progressive picture. “Panditji’s music spoke not only to the learned who saw music as a structured science, but the layman who didn’t understand the nuances. In many ways, it has shaped my approach to classical music,” he reveals. When Bhate takes stage with the brothers to perform classics from the Bhakti tradition, he hopes his guru’s vision will shine through.
Rahul Sharma and Kachra Khan
The artistes unanimously acknowledge the importance of furthering the classical art forms among younger listeners. Are cross-genre collaborations and fusion music the only means to this end, we ask. The brothers, who form part of the fusion band Anubhoothi, give us an interesting analogy, “Just like a batsman must be proficient in all formats of cricket to stay relevant today, we must aim to present our traditions in more modern ways to keep them alive.” Bhate, who has observed the scene evolve over the years, adds, “The past five years have been promising. Even at orthodox classical concerts, we are starting to see young faces in the audience.”
While the Mohans believe the Maximum City will be a fitting venue for this experimentation, there’s more to the city that’s luring the duo in. Srikrishna explains, “After extensive touring, we can safely declare that no city does pav bhaji like Mumbai. We’re big foodies and we can’t wait to head to one of the streetside stalls where you can see buttery pavs land on platefuls of bhaji up close.” Now that’s a jugalbandi that will
never go out of style.
ON November 23; 5.30 pm
AT Nehru Centre, Dr Annie Besant Road, Worli.
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