Pandit
Rajshekhar Mansur: Many people have asked me this
question. The reason in my understanding is socio-economic
in character. The Mysore king Wodeyar (mid-19th century)
was a great lover of music (Hindustani, Carnatic
as well as Western) and he used to hold a 10-day
music festival each year in Dussehra inviting musicians
from North India. The journey was rather long and the
musicians inevitably broke their journey at either Miraj
or Hubli on the way to and on the way back from Mysore.
There were a number of people in these towns who were
connoisseurs of music and urged the Ustads to stay on
for a few days to give concerts. This created a sort
of an ambience for classical music which had an important
part to play later on. Slowly, the general public began
taking interest in the various art forms. The other
reason is that our part of Karnataka, that of Belgaum,
Dharwad and Bijapur, belonged to the Bombay Presidency
before the states reorganization following the independence
of India. For this reason, there was quite a lot of
give and take from Maharashtra. A number of great musicians
such as Pt. Bhaskarbua Bakhale came to teach music at
the Training College in Dharwad where there was a teacher's
training programme. In fact, Pt. Bhaskarbua Bakhale
went on to stay in Dharwad for a period of one and a
half years taking up the cause of music. The third reason
is the tradition of musical dramas in this region, again
a contribution of Maharashtra. All the prominent musicians
of this region took part in these dramas and this formed
a major part of their own learning experience in the
realm of Indian classical music.
These
are some of the factors which contributed to the Dharwad
region becoming a fertile crucible for music to develop
in. Musicians such as Ust. Abdul Karim Khan saheb also
visited Dharwad frequently. A big contribution was also
made by the sages and saints in this region all of whom
gave prominence to music and invited musicians to perform
in religious festivals as seva.
IZ:
It is a well-known fact that your father also learnt
from Pt. Neelkanthabua of the Gwalior parampara. After
that, he made the shift to the Jaipur-Atrauli tradition
and learnt from the sons of the legendary Ust. Alladiya
Khan saheb, Ust. Manji Khan and Ust. Bhurji Khan. I
got to know that he also took some training in Carnatic
music as well.
Pt.
RM: No no, he did not learn Carnatic music in a systematic
way at all! While he was part of the drama company which
he had joined as a young boy of about 9 or 10, there
used to be a Carnatic musician who used to come and
give tunes to the various pieces. My father picked up
a little from him over a period of about one and a half
years or so. After that, he left for Miraj to learn
from Pt. Neelkanthabua for a period of 10 long years.
He then made a recording for HMV in 1932-33 singing
raags Adana and Gaud Malhar and it was when this recording
was played to Manji Khan saheb that he agreed
to accept my father as his disciple.
IZ: How in your view was your father able to intertwine
the styles of the Gwalior parampara along with that
of the Jaipur-Atrauli tradition and then work towards
developing a distinctive individualistic style of his
own?
 |
Pt.
RM: Let me start by saying that I place the four
key gharanas - Gwalior, Agra, Kirana and
Jaipur-Atrauli - at par with each other. In my
understanding, these four gharanas form
the cornerstones of the system of Hindustani music.
With his grounding in the rich Gwalior parampara,
where equal importance is given to swar
and laya, the foundation had been made
upon which he could build. This does not mean
that he found the stylistic approach of the Gwalior
parampara unsatisfactory in any way; he
just wanted more!
Rajshekhar
Mansur and his father Mallikarjun Mansur
|
He
had heard the gayaki of Ust. Alladiya Khan saheb as
well as his son Ust. Manji Khan and it created a burning
desire in him to learn this style of singing. What made
things slightly easier for him is the fact that in Jaipur-Atrauli
tradition also equal importance is given to swar
and laya. The only difference is that of approach
and interpretation. The approach of the Jaipur-Atrauli
tradition is much more complex in terms of phrases,
musicality, presentation (blending the various elements
of khayal gayaki) as well as the rare aprachalit
raags. Ust. Alladiya Khan saheb used to be a dhrupadiya
and it is said that he lost his voice and did not know
what to do. Legend has it that he saw Goddess Saraswati
in a dream and regained his voice the next day and then
turned his attention to khayal gayaki. He was
a genius insofar as what appeared to be a disadvantage
in his voice to many was used as an advantage by him
so much so that he was able to establish a new gharana
on the basis of his individualistic style. The complexity
and intricacy of the style was part of the appeal and
a challenge for my father. An added attraction was the
repertoire of aprachalit raags which did not feature
in the education of many other gharanas of the time.
IZ:
Tell us a little about the specifics of the Jaipur-Atraulit
tradition and its mode of presentation, styles of ornamentation,
its repertoire of jod, aprachalit and sankeerna raags
and your own understanding of its dynamics.
Pt.
RM: For me, the Jaipur-Atrauli gharana is not
a fixed system insofar as two people of the gharana
do not sing alike. People ask me, "why do you call it
a gharana then?" You see, the gharana is the
foundation on top of which the musician has the freedom
to develop a style based on his/her own capabilities.
The basics always adhered to are the equal importance
to swar and laya, starting off with the bandish
itself and the elaboration of the raag depending upon
the bandish. We ornament our unfurling and expansion
of the raag based on the bandish. Our conception is
that one bandish is one particular way of looking
at a raag; another bandish may reveal a slightly different
aspect of the raag. A slight misunderstanding is there
in the minds of many regarding the centrality of aakaar
in the gayaki of the Jaipur-Atrauli tradition. I have
seen and heard Ust. Bhurji Khan use ookaar and
eekaar regularly since these were the various
elements of the dhrupad style which Ust. Alladiya
Khan saheb picked up and incorporated into khyal
gayaki.
In
our style of singing, there is not much pause and leisurely
development of the notes. We conceive of music as a
continuum where one phrase leads to the other and so
on till you are able to see it blossoming in different
directions. We do not consider the various aspects of
khayal gayaki as watertight compartments; the
eight angs of khayal gayaki are very well knit
and we do not make any attempt to disentangle this beautiful
whole into the various parts. This has led many people
to say that the singing of the Jaipur-Atrauli tradition
is very cerebral in nature but not at the cost of the
rasa and the stirring appeal to the heart. What we have
acquired from our gurus is not just musical knowledge
but a vision to create, improvise and present in ways
which are fresh and new and it is this aspect which
I would like to place most emphasis on. We place emphasis
on the mool siddhant of the gharana but also
urge the individual practitioners to mould creative
identities of their own.
Let
me tell you a little about aprachalit raags now. For
me, the terminology jod is very problematic since no
arithmetic addition of two or three raags takes place
at all. An aprachalit raag is a very fine synthesis
of two or more raags out of which a new raag emerges.
These raags have an independence, autonomy and individuality
of their own from the raags which they take elements
from. For example, Raag Basanti Kedar is a transmutation
of the two constituent raags in such a way that a third
distinctive one emerges. Our gharana has a higher
conception of these raags and we do not consider them
to be mixed or jod at all. In fact, herein lies the
greatness of the contribution of Ust. Alladiya Khan
saheb who conceptualized these raags and presented them
in a way that had never been thought of before!
