The sound system wasn’t the greatest. A lot of feedback happening, the artists complaining that the monitors sucked.

Individual reviews:

1. Jalshaghar – A Hindustani jazz/fusion band from Pondicherry (I think). They were good altogether. Very tight – played typical ‘world’ fusion music. The drummer, the saxophonist and the keys were trained more in jazz. The sarod player and the tabla player were the Hindustani touch. Although the jugalbandi between the sarod and the sax was interesting, altogether there wasn’t anything too unique about Jolshagar. There seemed to be distinct Hindustani moments and distinct jazz moments. The instruments are tight but now they need to experiment and move beyond the world music tag.

PS: The tabla player was quite hilarous. Standing up in resignation, complaining that the monitors were too terrible for him to continue.

2. Hulivesh: Folk dance involving crazy dancing tigers. The little kid tiger was fun to watch. The body art and costumes were nice – but the crazy dancing went on for a bit too long. A story line would have made it more interesting.

3. Lounge Piranha – A post-rock band gracing a ‘world music’ fest with their presence. But something was wrong this time. But their first few songs just seemed off. The guy in the grey shirt with curly hair – Abhijeet? – was going off a lot. The flute prodigy Pervez squeaked his way into some song too. That didn’t work.  Things started to sound better when white shirt guy – Kamal? – took over vocals and Shalini came on bass.  Then things sounded better. George Mathen on drums was, as usual, awesome. The humour was there, slightly lamer than usual. But something was wrong. I’ve heard them at B-flat, in a smaller, more personal space. They were way, way better there. Perhaps it was the amphitheater? The music didn’t seem wholly interesting or original either. I think we’ve reached a post-post rock stage!

4. Prakash Sontakke group: This fusion group had AMAZING percussionists last year. 4 guys making awesome, awesome music. This year, it was anything great. Prakash Sontakke on slide guitar played the same old fusion. Then came his award winning Canadian friend – Pradhan (?) Michael Johnson weilding a guitar in a kurta and a strange topi. He sang some completely non memorable songs. The only memorable part of the show was a verbal jugalbandi between the drummer and the tabla player.

5. Bharat Sargam and group: If you have Indian blood in you, you will HAVE to raise your hands and thrust your hips to the qawalis of the Bharat Sargam group. These guys got the crowd going crazy! They spoke in simple Hindi and were understood by the majority of the crowd. The must-have qawal, Mast Qalander, was performed, although it wasn’t the best rendition I’ve heard. The accompanying instruments were surprisingly tuneful. They weren’t the best qawals on the planet – but they knew how to please the crowds. They strangely played some Bollywood tunes and Daler Mehndi instrumentals. Crowds went mad.

6. Vayali – Kerela folk music surviving on the USP of having no string instruments, only bamboo instruments. Duplicate of last year. Need to innovate. They were followed by drummers from Kerela too – Aadum Pambe got the crowds going again!

7. Low Rhyderz – hip hop and reggae! God nooo! Please noo! They’re Bangalore song was the only passable song. But please please please – no! No hip hop and pseudo-reggae next year!

8. Bharat Mata Nach Kud Baja – Old folks trying to play music after watching their instruments rust for many years. Thats wat these guys sounded like. The first song was out of tune – the bass and guitar weren’t going. The rest of it was uninteresting. A waste of time.

9. Kyle McCloud and Hayley  Sabella – greeted the morning with a prayer. The guy’s vocals kept going off, but the girl had a pleasant voice.

Feedback to Fireflies: If you organize an annual 12 hour music fest, you have to make it better with each year. More thought has to be given to the line up. You can’t have good artists only in the first half – and bring crappy artists for the morning hours. People have come from miles away just to listen to the music. Subjecting them to bad or passable music in the morning isn’t okay. It’s torture! Also, you can’t bring the same artists back year after year. There are a lot of extraordinary musicians in the country – who would happily play for Fireflies.

And please – say no to Indian hip-hop!

‘Growing Down’ is an initiative to produce a compilation of music (all languages, styles) exploring aspects of childhood and play.

The compilation has been inspired by the fragmented conversations we have with the child within us. As adults the disconnect we feel from the people and spaces around us often suffocates our spontaniety.

This effort has come up in response to our work on ‘Spirited Caravans,’ a process of setting up mobile cultural spaces across Bangalore’s diverse neighbourhoods and programming the spaces with projects around the theme of ‘Children and the City.’

The selected 15 tracks will be compiled into the ‘Growing Down’ album which will be released online and on a CD along with our partner labels. To know more, visit our website at http://growingdown.cityspinning.org

Deadline: October 15th, 2009

>> Contact

URL: http://growingdown.cityspinning.org
Email: growingdown@cityspinning.org

It’s strange to review a music concert and to say that the only thing missing was silence. But, strangely enough, that’s exactly how I felt after spending two hours listening to Advaita at Kyra, Indiranagar. Probably because I was wayyyy too close to the speakers sitting right in the front :) Anyway, to the music….

Advaita call themselves ‘a psychedelic/eclectic fusion band from New Delhi’. With eight members, the stage is crowded and the potential to go wrong is huge. Someone missing a beat, someone playing a wrong note. But with Advaita – this is impossible. Musically – they are superb. Tight, professional, and skilled.

The gig started with Mukti - something I hadn’t heard before. Quite nice, quite tight – setting high expectations. However, a few songs later, things seemed to get repetitive. Very nice layering, very nice harmonies (Anindo and Chayan), very very nice Sarangi (Suhail Yusuf Khan) and very very very nice Hindustani vocals (Ujwal Nagar). Most of the songs started softly and developed into a feverish pitch with superb drumming by Aman Singh Rathore. However, there was nothing to differentiate one song from another. The tunes weren’t really the kind that would get stuck in my head and I’d be humming them hours later.

But then came Why, one of their more catchy songs in my opinion. Chayan’s sweet, sweet voice completely enthralled me, and the staple diet of good rock music that Abhishek, Aman and Anindo grew up listening to became obvious. After Why, Advaita became an immersive act.

Desert Rain had some excellent solos by all members. Suhail on Sarangi – amazing, Abhishek’s guitaring – the fluidity and the Indian classical touch and the lovely slightly off jazz notes – loved it! But who I loved the most was Gaurav Chintamini on bass. He made playing the bass look easy! Enough that I would go to the next shop, pick up a bass and assume I should be able to play as easily! Crazy riffs – throughout!

Other songs I liked – Gates of Dawn, song Chayan tried to make the audience sing rock style, and Light. Very powerful, very strong.

To some of the low points: Lyrics are weak. Vocals were used more as an instrument – to sound good but not say anything substantial. Thats my other problem with Advaita – the instrument layering is in such depth – that the vocals get completely lost. And no one seems to take the lead (aside from Suhail on Sarangi – on occassion). There is such equality among the instruments – that there is no pivotal focus point – which is quite important in a live performance (in my opinion).

Then the tabla player was doing what? I don’t know. He was dancing/head bopping to the music more often then playing tabla. I think he could have definitely played a more prominent role.

Then the hindustani singer – he has an amazing voice – could definitely be to sing more than nice sounding scales. And what happened to ‘Mere Yaar’?? They ditched it at the last minute!

To Kyra – its an interesting space. A very personal space. Not intended for such a loud act as the one we witnessed. Advaita’s act was suited more for an open air amphitheatre gig. Perhaps they should try an acoustic gig – that would be very, very interesting to watch.  Hear the silence between the music that is the music!

Photos coming soon! (And bootleg recordings :D )

And can this music be used to understand words/language differently? A different version of spoken/auditory english maybe?

I began by typing! a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a a . A whole bunch of a’s. Recorded the sound on Soundbooth. Then I raised the pitch 3 octaves up (36 half-tones). So that the sound would be clearer.
However, there was a lot of ambient noise which also became audible (and sounded very creepy). Hear Audio.

Nontheless, I mapped out the pitches of the sound using a very cool voice-training program called Passaggio. Passaggio outputs a real time pitch map. The pitch of each sound appears a small green or red dot on the note it hits.

Because of all the ambient noise, my pitch map wasn’t very accurate. However, there was  a clear pattern. Clusters of dots appeared along certain notes. Using lines, I tried to map out the exact notes which appeared more frequently.

The outcome was ironical. I pressed the a-key some 19 times. Out of this, the note ‘A’ was the most common pitch. Actually it was halfway between G# and A. Some strange semi-tone. This note appeared in all 3 octaves mapped (in different intensities). A bass D note also appeared in less intensity.

Next step is to record and plot ‘Hello World’ and see what sounds appear.

Image from wikipedia

Night of the Fireflies

We reached only when Shabnam Virmani was saying her thanks, and telling people to come for the Kabir festival organized by Srishti (perfect timing). Following her was Prakash Sontakke and Group. The fireflies poster slates them as Hawaiian folk fusion. Now Prakash Sontakke was playing an electric slide guitar. His sounds were very Jeff Beck Space Blues (Angel and Deccan from Jeff Beck, Who Else?)  Obviously, there was a nice Hindustani classical touch that affected his sitar sound hawaiian guitar, especially in the song like Himalayan Spring. But the defining and most enjoyable moment while watching Prakash Sontakke and group, was watching the group jugalbandi. All four percussionists were astounding. Rating: 1. Guy on little drum 2. Guy on mrindagam 3/4. Table/Drums. Prakash was cool.. but more like a father figure/mentor. Guy on the keys was also cool accompaniest.

Followed by Jazz dude. Came in a breeze…like a summer breeze.. left like a summer breeze. guy was good, played tight. only bass was inaudible, and dint add that spunk it shud hv. the drums were good, but the snare had a harsh metallic sound. i’m not a huge fan of fast jazz, so didn’t care too much for the first two songs. the last song, how insensitive (and how beautiful you are???) was cool. slower pace, the drums did their thing, much better.
Followed by Swaratma. Wat can i say? Afro’s with pajamas, purple shirt, bald head, yellow army pajamas wiht a violin, guitarist iwth leather pants, bassist in a blue dhoti purple kurta, mrindagist in nehru topi lookin like ambedkar with his chashma. any band that gives in so much for the show-sharaaba is one thing. an entertainer. entertain they did. crowds loved them. singer comes in as a horse! .. shaank in their songs. fire throwers come on stage. its all about show.

the music wasn’t spectacular. it was tight. the guitarist had flow (but looked completley out of place from the rest of the band in his attire n behavoiur). the bassist played the comic fool while the singer sang out kabir. that was one song that worked. reggae version of sant kabir. wah. and bringing in lines like ‘sant kabir, agar abhi aaya, to 500 varsh mein koi fark nahi dikha. 500 saal pehle duryodhan drupadhi ke vastra nikalta tha. aaj hamari rama sena mangalore mein ladki ko chedh rahi hain hindustani sanskriti ke naam pe.’ .. wah . crowds loved it.

the songs .. khol sim sim re.. flat . starts of with a tribal instrument. which is cool. put just cos you have it doesn’t mean you have to play it.. or you realy know how to play it. it needs  a  little mroe skill before you start diong jugalbandi.

what really fell flat was their jugalbandi between mridanga, singer with tribal instrument and drums. perhaps because it followed prakash solanktee’s group which kicked ass.

music didn’t have much depth to it. pretty much stuck to one riff pattern. not much layering. singer started off weak, grew as the performance went by. struggled slightly on the higher notes, but their stage presence and enthusiasm – hats off! wonderful!

Follwed by what the MC said ‘lets bring it down a notch” .. kannada folk music. they kicked ass too.

then came

order

shabnam virmani

prakash sontankee

jazz – rex rossario n quintet??

swaratma

kannada folk – veeraghese

gustav marin

accapella – solviteur canedo

kerela – vayali

qawaali – shahid parvez of nagpur

geeta navale n the esperanto project

missed… bhumi thayi balaga, anasuya kulkarni n ranjankumar group