Asides

Sankara Sasthri and the rocker

This is a well written article by Jithin Das in his Google Buzz (found it through Thulasi) and I am re-publishing it here with due permission from him.

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By Jithin Das

There was this ‘famous’ scene in the movie Sankarabharanam where noisy neighborhood kids annoy Sankara Sasthri with loud music at midnight. The vocal was a lampoon, intentionally done to annoy Sasthri and guitars were off the track. Situation surely warrants an interception. Sasthri did it. Then the unusual happens.

Pathetic rockers inform Sasthri that this is not Sa Re Ga Ma music and he wont understand it. Sasthri in turn challenges the kidos by telling them he can sing whatever they can but they cannot sing the way he does. One of the guys try out a tra la la l and Sasthri mimics it perfectly. But when sastri hums a raga rock kid fails to repeat it. Ashamed, he accepts defeat. Well, movies are movies.

What would have happened in real (if the entire rock band members weren’t complete morons as we presume everyone except Indian classical singers to be! ) is more like this:

Rocker: “Sasthri, this is not your sa re ga ma. You think it is noise because you dont understand western music.”

Sasthri: “Is that so? I can sing whatever you can, but you cannot do that to me.”

Rocker: ” That challenge shows your ignorance, Sasthri. Let me tell you something. What I meant by sa re ga ma music is, your music follows only tones. Your system trained you to associate everything with a note, a pitch and a beat alone. Sounds are in solfage and anything that falls out, such as a chord may sound like noise to you.

This is evident from the very fact that you challenged me to sing a vocal bit so that you can repeat it. If I sing something, you- the master of Carnatic should be able to understand it at tones, pitch and beats. But the music we make is much more complex to be measured by these alone. Rock has its own different aspects. The one you just heard was a verse chorus, which has a very different effect than solo singing or harmonic singing . Asking one of us to do a solo verse is like telling me to separate sugar from my coffee so that you can prove coffee is just some grains of sugar. I hope you got it now.”

Sasthri: “Are you telling me your music is as systematic and scientific as classical music? Our popular songs are not.”

Rocker: “Yes it is. The difference is, the popular music or rather film songs here did not evolve . It is fusion of Carnatic or Hindustani and very basic western classical. But our music keeps on evolving. Rock inherited everything it can from classical to folksongs and then, it evolved as a new music genre. In fact it is not one system, it is several systems that keeps on evolving.”

Sasthri: ” Now I am getting it. May be it is so different and so complex that it doesnt sound like music to me.”

Rocker: “It is not so hard. As a person who knows music you should be able to understand an unfamiliar one too. Just listen to this guitar chord. It is called C major seventh . It is sa-ga-pa-ni played together. sa is the root note, ga & ni are the major notes, pa is the perfect note. Together it becomes the chord C major seven . Now can you identify this?”

Sasthri: ” it sounds like sa-ma- ga-dha- mixed.”

Rocker: “you got it, it is F major seven. ma is the root, dha & ga are majors sa is the perfect fifth. I told you it is not as hard as you think.”

Sasthri was impressed. He learned several new things that night. He sang too and the rock kids were mighty impressed by his perfect microtones and easiness of improvisation. He just doesnt need to write down anything to make an improvisation!

That night Sasthri decided to lead the brats to forming a new band where he will be one of the vocalists. Kind of fusion music, but very different from those who pathetically mix and match music. Sasthri did his sweet revenge to the orthodox Carnatic music fans who outcast him because of his suspected illicit affair . In his new world nobody cares a shit about the guy, they just want his music. He did not have to beg and borrow anymore to make both ends meet. Needless to say earned reasonably well, his band was popular enough to get some concerts every now and then, for a decade.

Aftermath of the Baba-giri

Back to square one. That’s what happened at the end of the fasting drama of Baba Ramdev. Everything remains the same except that we got to see Ramdev in a churidhar, Ramdev’s alleged ties with communal elements, a high-profile fasting stage and finally Ramdev quitting the biggest political entertainment show on mere promises. The man who claimed that yoga could cure the incurable diseases have finally given up to the doctors who have advised him “to abstain from yoga for two-three days and take rest“. Hmm..

Sonia Gandhi and Congress party must be laughing at all this. Had someone more credible and popular were on the forefront of these fights, they would have been in trouble handling the situation. But for their luck, the mass movements in the new India are always led by wrong people like Hazare or Ramdev who have questionable personality and stand on various issues. So the UPA government, the most corrupt government that we have seen in the recent history of India, could thrash the movement and go on to justify it. And the folks like Ramdev passed the ball to the UPA court that even the police mishandling of the Ramlila ground situation has been pushed down the memory lane.

But Ramdev did not say “at times like this, you do pranayam” as he did once. Instead, the yoga guru said he would form up an army of 11000 soldiers who would be trained in arms. Something that we can now call ‘the Baba-giri’. With the Congress on the revenge and has ordered many inquiries into the Yadav-turned-Dev Ramkrishna’s empire, we might see more entertaining news in the coming days about the yoga guru.

On another news, a Sadhu who also was on a fast-unto-death finally died in the same hospital as Baba Ramdev was admitted. There were no cabinet ministers to see him and discuss his demands and no long lines of sadhus or common man who were in support. His cause, a genuine one, was against the illegal mining to save Ganga river. On other such news, Irom Sharmila is still fasting, even after 10 years and is still being force-fed. Not many, including much of the middle-class crusaders, are bothered about it. And the middle-class arm-chair activists have now begun justifying their silence on these issues over several forums in the Internet. They say that middle-class cannot relate with the issues of Binayak Sen or Irom Sharmila, hence the silence. Reminds me of the poem/quote by the anti-Nazi theologian Martin Niemöller:

First they came for the Jews,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a Jew.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a trade unionist.

Then they came for the communists,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a communist.

Then they came for me
and there was no one left to speak out for me.

‘My Fellow American’

Here is “My Fellow American“, an online film and social media project, that is trying to do something about Islamophobia with sharing stories of people and trying to raise awareness. Checkout their website My Fellow American and also watch the teaser video below.

In all the material I have seen and read about Islam and the common perceptions about it, I have never seen or read a convincing speech like the TED talk given by Mustafa Akyol which makes a lot of sense. A must watch.

Ramdev Lila

The sad state of India is that even the agitations in the name of common-man are hijacked by people with vested interests. So the right movements are lead by the wrong people. Wrong people who support other wrong people and the wrong causes. People who are more interested in fame and publicity. People who have an eye on being in the line of power. That is what happened with Jan Lokpal Bill and now the fight against black money.

I have written earlier about Anna Hazare and his show. Now it’s the turn of Baba Ramdev, the yoga master. Like Jan Lok Pal Bill, I so very badly want to see some action done on the black money put in the foreign countries but like the JLP bill, this movement is also lead by the wrong man, or a man who has authoritative, suspicious and intolerant views on core issues. Ramdev asked for death penalty to the corrupt people and that’s going over the top. He wants sex education in schools need to be replaced by yoga education. He wants 100% swadeshi movement. He says homosexuals are sick people and English education should be replaced by Hindi.

I see utter non-sense, intolerance and ignorance in his views. This fellow clearly doesn’t understand how economy or global trade or free-market works (I don’t believe in a full-fledged free-market but a government controlled free-market). He is also pushing us to the back of the time and is being insensitive to the non-Hindi speaking regions when he pushes Hindi instead of English. The contribution of English to the youth and marginalized in this country is more than what this guy knows.

And who chose him to represent the 121 crore Indians as he claims himself? As far as I know he represents only his followers from across different parts of India and nobody else. He doesn’t have the right to speak authoritatively for the common man without the consent of the common man through a democratic process. The same so-called torch bearers of democracy need to learn a thing or two when they or their followers makes demi-gods out of them. Shanthi Bhushan said, “Ultimately the power is with Anna, so whatever Anna says has to be accepted” and as an NYT article claims, Baba Ramdev seems to have said, “I am very powerful“. Seems that the motto now is not power to “the” people but power to “some” people. The yoga guru seems to have said, “what the people need is honest, brave and responsible leadership” and what better example than himself to show the bravery of trying to escape the police in a churidhar!

Those who are clearly benefiting from all this is still the Congress party. Fortunately for them, the leaders of the movements against corruption and black money are such hypocrites so it is easy for the Congress party and the UPA to drive things their way, though I am sure they must be regretting the way they handled Ramdev issue with the midnight eviction episode.

And the churidhar-clad Baba, who has full support from the Sangh Parivar elements, has now warned the government that “next time in Ramlila, it will be Ravanlila“. We can only wait and see the turn of events.

About growing old

(Thoughts after one chat session with a friend)

old man I remember reading a quote about old age that, ‘old age is always 15 years ahead of my age‘ or something like that. When I was in school, I thought that the people who went to college were old. When I moved to college, I thought that the final year students were old. After college, I thought 25 was old and then 30. At 31, I don’t know what is old anymore. Are they the people who have kids in highschool? Or whose kids are married and have kids of their own? Or those who have retired or counting their time in the death bed?

I would have said that the old age is when you stop being young in your mind, but that’s not true (for some, its about the physique; keeping your body fit). That kind of statement comes from those who have seen only boring examples of the old age. A generation of lecturing, boring and ordering people. One can grow old gracefully and staying alive doesn’t have to be staying young. We just have to grow old gracefully. And to do that, and to stop being the uninteresting people that the youngsters hate, we just have to stop being the oldie that we hated when we were young. And how do we do that? I have the following suggestions.

1) Interact with young people : Youngsters are full of enthusiasm and ideas. You feel a certain level of energy when you talk to them and that could trigger some fresh thoughts in your mind. They seldom think of the risks involved or spend too much time on planning and focus their energy on execution. Whereas oldies spend too much time estimating the risk, drawing out a fool-proof plan and sometimes end up with discarding the idea of execution altogether (though I’m not downplaying the importance of proper plan and risk estimation here). Their years of experience would primarily lead them to see the negatives first and most, while the youngsters always see the positives first because of their passion and enthusiasm for the execution of their ideas.

2) Give tips and opinion, not lectures : I hated it when old people started lecturing me when I asked them for an opinion or help. They would just go on and on, as if my life totally depended upon their words and they take a kind of pride in it. If you’re a parent, do not use your ‘parent power’ on your children and give them your opinion and tips that could help them without getting into an elaborated lecture. That would really make an effect on them.

3) Do not ask for respect; earn it : Many old people seem to think that being old gives them the right to ask for respect from the younger generation. That may not work anymore. Apart from the basic human considerations (of considering and giving space to the old like we do with little children), I don’t think anybody would give respect to any person just because they are old unless they are part of family (certain odd rules work for families in the name of blood-relation). And there is nothing wrong in it. You have to earn respect in your life. Age is no license to ask for it. The sooner you realize this, the better.

4) Do not act like you’re young : Some old people seem to think that ‘acting young’ would give them space among the young generation, which in my observation is completely wrong. If you want to act young, take your friends or the people of your age to do that. Otherwise, you would be making a fool of yourself. You would think cracking porn jokes or doing ‘fun’ things with youngsters would make you acceptable among them but they would think that you are a joker and they would make fun of you at your back. Similarly with your children. A friend once wrote in his FB page that his father was strict until he was 19 years of old and then became a good friend. I think that makes the point.

How do you see growing up old? As for me, I see the years to come with much excitement. For I know that I have changed for good and learned many lessons in the years I have lived so far. I am curious about what life has in store for me in the years to come. To see what the world would turn out to be in the future years. To see how life and living would change. To see my family and children grow. To see what relationships mean as we pass on each stage in life. The only thing I am concerned about growing old is to depend on someone else. About going senile, being bedridden and immobile. That truly is scary.

But what I don’t want to be is what my friend told me in the chat conversation – “I don’t want to end up like a wise cracking smart ass“.

What are your thoughts? 🙂

Image: Arvind Balaraman / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Enabling mobile technology for music

[This is my fifth article for My Smart Life, an initiative by Nokia India that features guest authors from various walks of life who have made use of technology and social media in their work and life. Go to the website to check out rest of the articles there.]

Do you know what is the most used application in a musician’s mobile phone? It is a sound recorder. It is amazing how a simple application such as a sound recorder could speed up the creative process for the musicians. It is because you could not tell when a tune strikes your mind. It could be when you are in a bus or train, or when you are in the middle of something, away from home. In such situations, either you could go get your recording gear and record your tune, but it’s not easy to go get it in such situations. The next option is to wait until you come back home but the chances are that the tune that struck you is lost by the time you reached home. So you need an instant solution for such scenarios and the best possible solution is a sound recorder. As they say in the book Super Freakonomics, sometimes the best solution is also a cheap and simple solution.

The sound recorder could be useful in many other scenarios. If you are a musician who wants to create a particular sound clip – say for example, traffic buzz, or the sound of people walking in a park etc – to use in your next production, it’s much more easy now. And if you couldn’t wait to get an opinion from a friend about the new song tune or a sound clip, you could just connect online and share the audio file using your smart phone. You could get instant feedback and could record a fresh new session if you thought it needed a revision.

Most of the tunes I have composed by myself were first recorded in my smart phone. And many of the interviews I have done for my podcast were also recorded in my phone and it has helped me a great deal in bridging the geographical differences. These have enabled me in successfully drafting up a song for my music blog, for Blogswara or for my Malayalam podcast. I learned about the ease of using a mobile phone to record the songs from a musician friend. But like musicians, podcasters could also benefit from their smart phones.

That is not all. You have many music apps available in the Symbian, iPhone and Android apps galore in the market. Some of them lets you create or play music using the keypad. So it’s not just your voice but if you are somebody who orchestrates a song, these apps would help you do a rough draft of what you were thinking of for a score.

But how about the quality of recorded vocals? Well, you have many audio recording devices available today that records clear voice, and some devices are designed to capture the voice that comes within a pre-defined area. If this is implemented a mobile phone, and that is not an impossible thing if we look at the way that technology is advancing, it could be so helpful to musicians and podcasters.

With the arrival of touch screens and mobile apps, things could go even further. It wouldn’t be a distant dream to think about the leading music software companies releasing a mobile app version of their software. Imagine if Adobe Audition, Nuendo or Garage Band released a lighter version of their software to suit the on-the-go need of a musician. It wouldn’t be too much of a dream because we did not have specialized versions of mobile phones to hear music or to use for business needs a few years ago and see how many options we have in our time.

With mobile technology and smart phones, your road to success in the field of music has been made easier.