By MOHAN NADKARNI The Economic Times, August 21, 1988 Gurudev Tagore had a world view of life. His genius therefore spanned a truly phenomenal range in creativity. And that is what rightly made him the most celebrated pioneer of creative music in modern times. Though Tagore’s music did fall outside the rigid traditional domain, it was certainly not wholly non-classical. What he conceived and...
Bal Gandharva: On the sands of time (Parts I-VIII) By MOHAN NADKARNI The Economic Times, June 21, 1987 Bal Gandharva: On the sands of time—I He was hailed as “Nat-Samrat”, the King of Thespians. His was a fabulous career that spanned an almost unbroken period of four decades during which he ruled supreme on the Marathi musical stage as much by his striking presence,...
By MOHAN NADKARNI writing as GURUDEV SHARAN Times Weekly, August 25, 1973 KANADA KE PRAKAR By Jaisukhal Tribhuvan Shah ( Published by the author, pp 332, Rs 16) The colourful KANADA Group of ragas is a class in itself in the rich and varied repertory of north Indian music. Thanks to recent research in musicology, it is now conclusively proved that many of these...
By MOHAN NADKARNI The Economic Times, September 11, 1988 Eclecticism is the trend that is taking root today. It is specially discernible in the approach of the younger generation of artistes. And, that too, in vocal music, because there has not been such clear-cut differentiation in concept and style in instrumental music. This was resoundingly brought home by the recitals of Ashwini Bhide-Deshpande and...
By MOHAN NADKARNI The Economic Times, September 24, 1989 The week that was took me to Bhopal, where I witnessed an event, the like of which was neither conceived nro presented before. It was a three-day soiree, styled “Sarangi Mela” organised by the Bharat Bhavan Trust from September 15. The event was something much more than a “mela” as the term is conventionally understood...
By MOHAN NADKARNI The Ecomomic Times, August 28, 1988 Although the year in India is conventionally divided into six natural seasons, known as “ritus”, it is the rainy season (“Varsha”), which has held a special significance to predominantly agrarian people like us. Not surprisingly, therefore, an immense treasure of songs from pre-historic Vedic times down to the 20th century Tagore has come down to...