Vol. 50 No. 2 Summer 2006
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60 Sing Out! • Vol. 50 #2 • Summer 2006
D ebashish Bhattacharya is a man com-fortable with all kinds of seeming in-congruities. How else to explain amusician who, though born in India’sfar eastern city of Kolkata, made his
mark on the world playing Hawaiian slide gui-tar? And how else to understand an artist whopassionately defends eons of tradition while atthe same time urges technology ever forward?
Those polarities dissolve in conversationswi th th is energe t ic and warm vi r tuoso .Through discussion, and by witnessing hissuperb performances, one begins to under-stand that those elements which may appearso superficially incompatible actually makea grea t dea l of sense in the context ofBhattacharya’s background. Of course, thosemarriages of opposites are also the result ofhis extraordinary enthusiasm, impassionedcreativity and technical virtuosity.
Bhattacharya had an auspicious beginningas a child prodigy. Born in 1963 to parentswho were accomplished vocalists and withmusicians in the family for generations, hebegan playing Hawaiian steel guitar as athree-year-old ... and started out on a full-size model. His father had received the gui-tar as a present, but didn’t play it himself.
BY ANASTASIA TSIOULCAS
Hindustani Slide Master
DebashishBhattacharya
Melds Traditionwith Innovation
Opposites Attract:
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Summer 2006 • Vol. 50 #2 • Sing Out! 61
Curious, Bhattacharya began playing, and quickly devel-oped proficiency; in fact, he made his broadcast debuton All India Radio at the ripe old age of 4.
This might seem odd: how would young Indian musi-cians of any era be likely to pick up a Hawaiian-styleguitar? In fact, by the time young Debashish picked itup, the instrument had already been well-established inIndia for decades, and especially so in Bhattacharya’shometown of Kolkata , the ci ty formerly known asCalcutta. The guitarist explains: “In 1929, a Hawaiianguitarist named Tau Moe traveled to India and stayed inKolkata for seven years. While in India, he played forpeople like Winston Churchill, Albert Einstein, MahatmaGandhi and Rabindranath Tagore.”
In fact, Tau Moe initiated a mini-craze for Hawaiian-style guitar in Kolkata. Bhattacharya filled in the story:“Some youngsters in Kolkata started playing the instru-ment as well, performing contemporary European songsand even Rabindra sangeet, which is the revered andextremely popular Bengali tradition of setting Tagore’spoetry to music,” he said. “And from Kolkata, the slideguitar quickly traveled to other Indian cultural capitals,like Benares, Patna, Delhi, Bangalore, Chennai (Madras)and Mumbai (Bombay).” Over time, then, the steel gui-tar has been transformed into an instrument perfect forplaying Indian classical music, much as another “foreign”instrument, the violin, had earlier.
Recently, Bhattacharya had the chance to repay TauMoe for his legacy by creating a whole new genre withinIndian classical music. “In 2004,” Bhattacharya recalled,“Tau Moe invited me to perform in Hawaii,and friends there brought me to the Uni-versity of Hawaii’s residence program.While I was in Hawaii, I played a tributeto him, and we gave a concert at his resi-dence. I’m really fortunate that I got achance to meet this gentleman in mysearch. I left Hawaii that June, and onJune 25th he passed away. So it’s been75 years since Tau Moe’s arrival inCalcutta,” Bhattacharya noted, “andin those 75 years the guitar has beenadapted and adopted in our culture inmany ways.”
B hattacharya’s parents were his earliest teachers. Like gen-erations of musicians before him, the guitarist learned
the rudiments of Indian classical music through an oral tra-dition; he started out by singing rhythmic patterns and scaletones in a system called sargam, akin to the Western solfegesystem, which teaches the basic outline of a given raga.(Raga literally means “color” or “passion.” While often com-pared to a Western scale, it isn’t the same thing. Rather, araga encompasses and dictates the notes themselves, themodal structure, the notes’ relationship to each other, theascending and descending pattern to be used, characteristicmovements, and – not least importantly – the piece’s emo-tional mood.)
From that foundation, Bhattacharya quickly learned tra-ditional compositions for various ragas, and how to impro-vise on those compositions. By the time he was 6-years-old,he was learning Western notation and Western-style guitarplaying, and also studied with a relative, Haradhan RoyChowdhury, who played sitar and the bowed instrumentcalled the esraj. By 9, Bhattacharya was keen to mimic thesitar and esraj on his beloved guitar, and he shortly beganformal studies of the sitar with Pandit Gokul Nag. With thisswirl of various instrumental and vocal colors surroundinghim, it wasn’t surprising when he began trying to evoke allthese sounds on his Hawaiian guitar.
Debashish Bhattacharya first heard his guitar guru,Pandit Brij Bhushan Kabra, in 1983 when the older mu-sician was giving a performance on All India Radio. (Both
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Debashish Bhattacharya and hisTrinity of Guitars: a 24-string hollow-
necked chaturangui (in front) a 14-stringgandharvi behind and a small 4-string
anandi, which means ‘bliss’ or ‘joy.’
Summer 2006 • Vol. 50 #2 • Sing Out! 61
62 Sing Out! • Vol. 50 #2 • Summer 2006
the terms pandit and ustad are honorifics meaning“teacher” or “master”; the former is given to art-ists from Hindu backgrounds, while the latter isassigned to Muslim musicians.) “I was attracted tothe way he performed the alap ,” Bhattacharyanoted, speaking about the introductory section of atraditional raga structure, in which the soloist ex-plores the notes of the raga in a slow and unmeteredway. “He had such a tranquil and devotional styleof playing,” Bhattacharya observed.
Brij Bhushan Kabra also provided Bhattacharyawith a link to another great musical lineage: he inturn was playing under the guidance of a legendarysarod player. Through that connection, explainsBhattacharya, “Ustad Ali Akbar Khan is then mygrand guru.”
Bhattacharya and Brij Bhushan Kabra first met in1984 via an introduction made by Bhattacharya’s otherguru, the renowned vocalist Pandit Ajoy Chakraborty.The younger guitarist had already received acclaim andwas well on the path to innovation: by the time he was 21,he had received the President of India award and had al-ready invented one new slide guitar called the chaturangui(more on that later). Despite those impressive accomplish-ments, Bhattacharya decided that the time had come to pur-sue intensive study with Brij Bhushan Kabra.
“Living with my panditji was almost like being in ahermitage,” Bhattacharya recalled, “especially after hav-
ing been born and brought up in the cultural warmth ofKolkata, where there was so much music and so manyactivities at home with my parents.”
The cultural and logistical transitions were hard as well,the guitarist admitted; moving across the country from thefar eastern state of Bengal to India’s very western-most stateof Gujarat was in many ways as though the young artist hademigrated to a different country. “Leaving my language, my
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Bhattacharya playsa chaturangui, thefirst instrument inthe “trinity” ofguitars he hadinvented.
Summer 2006 • Vol. 50 #2 • Sing Out! 63
food habits, friends, fans, gigs ... it was complete surrenderto my guru,” he mused. “It was leaving my first gurus, myparents and my very young siblings. And, for my family, Iwas also the bread-and-butter earner. So they sacrificed, too.”
Given those realities, Bhattacharya was understandablyapprehensive, but he blossomed under the structure of thetraditional guru-shishya parampara, the “teacher-student lin-eage.” That tradition entailed that the younger musician be-came a part of his guru’s household and family. “My guruand guruma (my teacher’s wife) took care of everything,”the guitarist explains. “They never allowed me to bringmoney from home.”
Bhattacharya’s living arrangements meant that he wassurrounded by music all the time. “Living with my guru, Ipracticed and studied somewhere between eight and 16 hoursa day,” he recalled. “Usually I would practice between 8 p.m.and 5 a.m., and in the afternoon as well. And study includedlistening to and learning new ragas, analyzing raga struc-ture, talking with my guru, and composing myself.”
O ver time, various Indian instrumentalists had tinkeredwith the construction of the slide guitar to make it even
more appropriate for the sounds and styles of the sub-continent, and Brij Bhushan Kabra was no exception. “Heplays the Gibson C-400,” said Bhattacharya. “His ideawas to evoke the rudra veena, the very tra-ditional hollow-necked fretted instrumentwith two gourd resonating chambers at ei-ther end. So instead of having six guitarstrings, he put on three main strings andadded chikari (sympathetic) strings in theback to play with the thumb. But I felt thatthese three strings weren’t adequate ... thegui tar loses the courage of the mandrasaptak, or the lower register.”
Bhattacharya has also been a guitar experi-menter. “Since childhood, I thought that the‘voice’ of the guitar should be Indian,” he said.“So I experimented a lot over the years. I thoughtthat our guitar should be hollow-necked, like oursitar, sarod, sarangi and veena instruments. Icreated a hollow-necked guitar in 1979; it wasthe first model of the instrument that I calledthe chaturangui. It has the tonality and perfor-mance quality of the guitar, plus those of the si-tar, sarod, violin and rudra veena. That’s wherethe name comes from ... chatur means ‘four,’ andang means ‘attributes.’”
After making more tweaks like adding morereverberating strings, Bhattacharya’s final ver-sion of the chaturangui was completed in 1984.It was to be the first instrument in Bhattacharya’s“trinity” of new guitars he has invented.
“In 1992,” Bhattacharya continued, “came thesecond guitar, gandharvi, which is a fourteen-stringed guitar. I found that when a musicianglides on two strings together, the notes haveincreased sustenance. It actually sounds like a
twelve-string guitar, but also has the tone of the traditionalbowed sarangi instrument, which is tragically almost a lostinstrument in our culture. It’s such a sad situation. I feel very,very blessed when my gandharvi also brings out that sarangi-like cry. The name refers to the sound of gandharva loka, theworld of celestial beauty, where earth and sky meet.”
The last instrument in the trinity brought the guitarist backfull circle to the steel guitar’s Pacific roots. “In 1997, I wastraveling in Hawaii,” the guitarist recalled, “and I was play-ing with many Hawaiian guitarists and ukulele players. I wasin the mood to experiment with a smaller, four-stringed-styleinstrument, and the result was the third guitar. It sounds likea cry of joy from a baby, and so I named it anandi, whichmeans ‘bliss’ or ‘joy,’” Bhattacharya concluded happily.
During a complete concert, Bhattacharya plays each ofthe guitars, in turn, to create an arc of moods and tonal tex-tures. “Whenever I play the trinity of guitars,” he shared, “Iplay first the chaturangui for 45 minutes or an hour-and-a-half, for the first half of the concert; it is ideal for NorthIndian instrumental styles, such as those of the Maihargharana (school), which is the tradition of Ustad AllauddinKhan and his son, my grand guru, Ustad Ali Akbar Khan.Then, in the second half of my program, I play the gandharvifor another 45 minutes or an hour, and then I always add inthe style of south Indian classical music. Finally, when it’s
DISCOGRAPHY
Guitar, 1992, India Archive Music #1007w/Mark A. Humphrey and Subhankar Banerjee,
Calcutta to California, 1996, FrequencyGlide #001
w/Samir Chatterjee, Hindustani Slide Guitar,1997, India Archive Music #1026
w/Subhashis Bhattacharya and Bob Brozman,Sunrise, 1998, Sagarika #500-09
w/John McLaughlin and others, Remember Shakti, 2000,Polygram #549044
Reflection of Love, 2000, Rageshree Music #109Hindustani Slide Guitar, 2000, India Archive Music #1042Young Masters, 2003, Music Today #92067w/Bob Brozman, Mahima, 2003, Riverboat #1029w/Brij Bhushan Kabra, Call of the Desert, 2003, Saregama
#505023: Calcutta Slide-Guitar, 2005, Riverboat #1036
• Video:Hindustani Slide, 1995, Vestapol #13031Various, World of Slide Guitar, 1996, Vestapol #13061Sheer Magic, Gramophone / Saregama #50051
CONTACTSBOOKING: Herschel Freeman Agency, Inc., 7684 Apahon Lane,
Germantown, TN 38138; Ph: 901-757-4567; Fax: 901-757-5424; E-mail: <[email protected]>; Web:<www.herschelfreemanagency.com>.
GENERAL INQUIRIES: Debashish Bhattacharya, 204/1 Regent Colony,Kolkata 700 040, India; Ph: +91-94334-27873; Fax: +91-33-2471-3250; E-mail: <[email protected]>.
ON THE WEB: <www.debashishbhattacharya.com>
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64 Sing Out! • Vol. 50 #2 • Summer 2006
T ranslating as “Joy,” “Aanandam” is based on “RagaMishra Shiva Ranjani,” and features Debashish playing his
original slide ukulele, the anandi. Capturing the peaceful, ro-mantic mood of the source piece, Debashish makes the hollownecked instrument sing with both joy and sorrow over the six-beat rhythm of the tabla. “Aanandam” leads off 3: Calcutta Slide-Guitar, Debashish’s 2005 album featuring original compositionsperformed on his Trinity of Guitars (Riverboat #1036; avail-able from World Music Network, 6 Abbeville Mews, 88 ClaphamPark Rd., London SW4 78X, U.K.; Ph: +44-20-7498-5252; Web:<www.worldmusic.net>).
time for a light classical song like a thumri orfor a folk tune, I take anandi on my lap.”
Bhattacharya observed that in retrospect,he sees the creation of these three new gui-tars corresponding to three different phasesof his life. “During the time the chaturanguievolved, I was studying singing in the Patialaand Gwalior styles as well as playing gui-tar,” he recalled, and so the connection whichhis innovative creation has to the traditionalinstruments which inspired it – and, in turn,their evocation of the gliding qualities andrich resonance of the human voice – were anessential link to his vocal studies of the time.
“The gandharvi, “Bhattacharya continued,“was designed and built during the time whenI became attracted to Karnatic (South Indianclassical) music. But at the same time, thegandharvi evokes the colors of flamenco gui-tar, and the tonality of Middle Eastern instru-ments like the oud and the zither called a qanun. And theanandi was developed when I became a father. Finally, Icould realize the clean and innocent tone of a baby, whogives sheer joy, vibrating energy and happiness.”
These three instruments are on superb display on lastyear’s album for Riverboat Records, called 3: CalcuttaSlide Guitar. It features Bhattacharya in mesmerizing per-formances of Ragas Basant Mukhari, Tilak Kamod, andMishra Shivaranjani, with tabla accompaniment by hisyounger brother, Subhasis Bhattacharya. After the album’scritical success, the guitarist anticipates another busyseason ahead; he will be touring the U.S. and Canada thisfall, along with brother Subhasis and their sister, the vo-calist Sutapa. He is also working on a follow-up album.
W hile Bhattacharya is a technical innovator, he is eager topreserve the traditional ways of teaching and learning
which have sustained Indian classical music for centuries.He fears, however, that the next generation of musicians maynot be able to sustain the guru-shishya parampara, with thephysical proximity, emotionalopenness, and mental disciplinethat this centuries-old method oflearning requires.
“My own students have adifferent percept ion of theteacher-student relationship al-together,” he observed wist-fully. “They may not be will-ing to leave their parents orwhat they are doing to stay withme, without having expecta-tions other than just being mydisciple.
“Materialism and sponsor-ship come in the way of study-ing music today,” he asserts.
“Learning this art from a famous guru is generally viewedas a shortcut to fame and glory. But as both a disciple and aguru myself, I realize that both student and teacher have tohave an unconditional, loving relationship towards eachother. My gurus treated me like more than their sons, andthey are more than fathers to me.”
It is this philosophy that is at the center of the guitarist’sown school in Kolkata, called Bhattacharya’s School of Uni-versal Music; it’s a residential school for both Indian andforeign students. “Raga is not a material thing,” he mused.“It is a realization ... an expression of life. I teach the sameway my own gurus did, and our school provides support tothe students who can’t afford to buy a guitar or supplies. Bysupporting our students,” he said emphatically, “I believewe can support the existence of Indian classical music inour society. This is my religion.”
The balance between tradition and evolution is anothertenet in Bhattacharya’s musical religion. “My entire life,”mused Bhattacharya, “has been spent in service of mak-
ing a b r idge be tween thegolden treasure of Indian ragatradition and the wonderful fu-ture of the global village.
“For me,” he continued,“tradition and evolution areequally important. Traditiondoes not live in the Pyramids,or in the Taj Mahal. Traditioncannot survive without evolv-ing in a dynamic way that re-sponds to the current timesand to contemporary society. Itleaves no room for compla-cency. And every day, the mu-sic gains more dimensions asit is performed in new places,in front of new audiences.”
Composed and Arranged by Debashish Bhattacharya© Riverboat UK Music / MCPS
AanandamAanandamAanandamAanandamAanandam TRACK 20
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Bhattacharyaawarding and
receiving blessingsfrom Tau Moe during
the University ofHawaii’s
residenceprogramin 2004.
