The Ramakrishna Mission Institute of Culture, in association with Jalshaghar, presented Triveni, in memory of the shehnai player, Ali Ahmed Hussain Khan, who passed away recently. A combination of shehnai, flute and sarod was presented by Hassan Haider Ali Khan (son of Ali Ahmed Hussain Khan), Sudip Chattopadhyay and Kaushik Mukherjee. They started with the perfect evening raga, Yaman, and continued with a beautiful gat after an aochar.
Although the vistaars and the taans of the madhyalaya teentaal gat were not extra ordinary, the trio was able to bring out the quintessence of the raga. The small intricacies of vistaars in the lower and middle octaves were pleasant to the ear. Shehnai, sarod and flute no doubt made for a difficult combination as these three instruments have completely different flavours and there is always a chance of shehnai sounding more prominent than the others when these three are played together. But coordination of the artists in this programme created a perfect balance.
The strains of shehnai and flute went parallel. Sarod worked as a good support system and did not create much expectation. The taans and the vistaars of the upper octave on flute were quite interesting. The next presentation was raga Nand or Anandi Kalyan. The jovial mood of the raga was wonderfully captured by the instruments. Starting from the aochaar to ektaal gat, the presentation was rhythmic; some touches of the shehnai were praiseworthy. The programme concluded with a Bhairavi composition. Kumud Ranjan Santra ably accompanied the artists on tabla.
Bhawanipur Sangeet Sammilani took the initiative to bring out new possibilities of Indian classical music in their three-day programme. Banya Bandyopadhya's rendition of Yaman on the first day was disappointing. She was accompanied by Rupak Mitra on tabla and Somenath Bardhan on harmonium. Young vocalist Debargha Roy enchanted the listeners with Raga Saraswati, followed by a brief presentation of Raga Megh. He concluded his part with a dadra in Kirwani and a Marathi bhajan. Shankar Patra and Somenath Bardhan accompanied him on tabla and harmonium.
The tabla lahara of Gorachand Chattokhundi was mainly about the peshkar, kayda and rela on chartal sawari, followed by teentaal. The violin recital by Sudip Chattopadhyay was entertaining. He played Puriya Dhanashree with care. He concluded with a famous composition of Ustad Ali Akbar Khan in Mishra Jhinjhoti (which was used in the film, Jhinder Bandi). The sarod duo of Shiraj Ali Khan (the grandson of Ali Akbar Khan) and Dwiptanil Bhattacharjee started with alaap, jod and jhala in raga Bageshree. Although they tried to create an ambience using pakhwaj in jod and jhala, the presentation was immature. The gat in Kirwani was better and one enjoyed the rendition of Mishra Bhairavi. They were accompanied by Nishant Singh on pakhwaj and Arijit Tagore on tabla.
