February is a crazy month for a music journalist. We are just mid-way through the month, and there have been the Allarakha tribute concert, two shows by guitarist John McLaughlin and his band the 4th Dimension, the Mahindra Blues Festival featuring the legendary John Mayall, numerous Indian classical events and the annual February season of the Symphony Orchestra of India (SOI).
Where to go, where not to? On Sunday, February 11, it was a toss-up between Mayall at Mehboob Studios and Jacek Kaspszyk at the Jamshed Bhabha Hall, conducting an adaptation of Richard Wagner’s ‘The Ring Of The Nibelung’. I don’t dare to type the original German term. Oh, the spellings of Western classical musicians and compositions always drive me into a frenzy. As chance would have it, I could attend neither thanks to a sudden bout of fever. But hope to when Kaspszyk conducts again on Friday at the same venue, including some other shows for the festival which goes on till March 11, featuring compositions of Josef Haydn, Ludwig Van Beethoven, Franz Schubert, Felix Mendelssohn, Gustav Mahler and Richard Strauss.
The SOI concerts have always been a delight. I remember sitting next to a beautiful lady enjoying Mahler’s Fifth Symphony Fourth Movement ‘ Adagietto ’. But this was Western classical music. We loved the piece. But couldn’t exchange glances, forget names or numbers.
Among genres, Western classical has been my most recent addiction. By recent, I mean since 2003. I was on a two-month language fellowship in Munich, Germany, and the Goethe Institut gave me a card to attend various concerts. A new-found friend waxed eloquent about Wagner’s ‘Ring’. I was totally clueless, responding with Rolling Stones lyrics. That is, until I attended the show. I had previously interviewed Western classical musicians without understanding what they said. They didn’t know what I was asking. So imagine what appeared in print. But in Munich, one thing led to another. I visited Austria — Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s birthplace in Salzburg, and Johann Strauss Jr.’s drawing room in Vienna. I bought the Mozart chocolates, T-shirts and caps and tonnes of CDs of various composers.
To use a Hindi term, the genre became a ‘ keeda ’. Hope the snobs don’t snigger. Back in India, I saw Zubin Mehta and Charles Dutoit conducting. And then the SOI seasons twice a year. I think Khushroo N. Suntook, chairman of the National Centre for the Performing Arts, is largely responsible for creating this movement in Mumbai and the rest of India, along with conductors Marat Bisangaliev and Zane Dalal, besides many musicians, many not Indian.
I do hope I got all spellings right. If not, one glass of red wine less for me.
The author is a freelance music writer
