Known for collaborating with the best in the business, Pandit Vishwa Mohan Bhatt says maintaining the purity of Indian classical music is his biggest strength. Even more than two decades after it made waves, once cannot forget the flawless blend of his Mohan Veena and Ry Cooder’s slide guitar in "A Meeting by the River", which won them the Grammy Award. The globe-trotting musician recently stopped over in his homeland and played at Vrindavan followed by three back-to-back concerts for HCL Concert series, ‘True to the Roots’.
As he described himself a self-made musician, it made one curious, and as one gently reminded him of his musically-enriched family background, it started a refreshing conversation.
Excerpts:
You were born in a musical family with both parents being vocalists and other siblings playing some instrument or the other. Tell us about your formative years.
Of course, both my parents (Manmohan Bhatt and Chandrakala Bhatt) were noted vocalists and music teachers. My mother was the first ever music teacher who introduced music in academics in my home town, Jaipur. She was the disciple of Qayam Khan of Senia Gharana and Mohan Lal Kathak. My earliest memory of her is she taking me to her morning lessons when I would be in her lap listening to the morning ragas like Bhairav, Ramkali, Kalingada, Asawari, Jaunpuri and Lalit, et al. Those morning melodies and compositions are still precious in my memory.
What about your father?
Yes, students used to come to him to learn music. Some of them were ‘koodh’ (dullards) for whom he would repeat the lesson again and again. I was benefited most by those lessons. When I said that I’m a self made musician, I meant that I never received formal music training. These inputs were my only lessons.
But you are a disciple of Pandit Ravi Shankar?
Oh! he was our idol. We used to worship him. He was the guru of my elder brother Shashi Mohan Bhatt, who was one of his earliest three disciples including Uma Shankar Mishra and Jamaluddin Bhartiya. We used to copy the way he walked, talked and played sitar in our childhood games when I would enact Pandit ji and my younger brother would become Ustad Alla Rakha and would ask the audience, composed of family members, to clap! Much later, I became his disciple.
Listening to your parents, you must have learnt singing first, how did you come to Mohan Veena?
I learnt vocal and then violin from my elder brother Ravi Mohan. The turning point came when a beautiful German girl came to my father to learn Hindustani music on guitar. I got attracted to both, the girl and her instrument. I was unable to Indianise the girl, but succeeded in making the instrument so! My idea was to have something which had the sound and technique of Indian instruments like veena, sitar, sarod, sarangi and santoor, all in one, and also the sustained sound to convey my imagination of a taan spanning the whole octave in one stroke. (He hums a long aalap in raga Bihag, adorned with kan, meend and other melodious harkats to show what he meant.)
The ‘pickup’ attached to your instrument is a recent phenomenon. Was all this that you hummed just now, was audible to the audience in that earlier version, or you achieved it only afterwards?
No, no it was there earlier too but yes, as you have been watching me since long, you have seen the instrument evolve to a great extent. My pickup is not the usual contact pick up that catches the irrelevant sounds also. I use pickup meant for strings only. It is under the wires so that I can control my tone, my reverb, echo, equalisation, according to how much bass or sharpness I require. If the sound system, for instance, has the sharpness, I lessen mine or vice versa.
What about the technical aspect, do you use the technique of ‘Dir Dir’, etc?
No, this is the sarod technique. It is, of course, very special to my own Maihar gharana, but I avoid it because it is not suitable to my instrument which is more apt to gaayaki ang carrying the elongated ‘meend’ very well (sings to demonstrate). The suitability of the instrument is important in relation to what is in your mind or imagination that you want to convey. You have to exploit the capability of your instrument.
You became the disciple of Pandit Ravi Shankar, while your sister was learning under Pandit Damodar Lal Kabra. You never thought of learning under him, since he was the first artiste to play Hindustani music on guitar?
Of course, he was the first one to bring guitar to Indian classical music. He was the senior most disciple of Ustad Ali Akbar Khan and his contribution was immense. He was deeply respected in my family. He had a strong influence on me and I was inspired by him but he did not come home to teach my sister. She went to Jodhpur, where he lived. My vision was different from that of Kabra Saheb. I wanted to have tarab strings in my instrument, and did not want to imitate anybody.
How did you name your instrument after yourself?
By the time I had added tarab strings and tumba to it, it no more remained a guitar. It was my friend Kavi Alexander from the US, the producer of our Grammy Award winning album, who suggested that since you have developed it to its present ‘avatar’, it should be named after you. And as you know all string instruments were called veena in ancient times and it also resembles the vichitra veena or batta been played with stone, I named it Mohan Veena. I have not only created it, I repair it myself as well. One should use technology discerningly.
You belong to Maihar Gharana, but what do you think of gharana tradition in the present scenario?
Gharana parampara is important because it differentiates the style, or the way you elaborate a raga or a particular composition. It becomes your own signature and you are recognised by the name of your gharana. The problem is that one is exposed to the speciality of every gharana nowadays that music is becoming a mixture of all. What I think is, ultimately music is music, and there should be no boundaries. Take whatever you like from any gharana and make that nuance, your own. Your music should not appear borrowed or quilted.
Tell us about your rich experience of fusion and pan-cultural collaborations with Western artistes such as Taj Mahal, Béla Fleck and Jerry Douglas.
I’ve completed performing in 83 countries, playing with international artists. My very first collaboration with Ry Cooder got us the Grammy award. I have played with erhu, a Chinese instrument with just two strings and the two-sided bow played both of them alternately. It has got lovely sound. I have also played for Sultana album with the Arabian instrument uud. I have enjoyed playing with the Afro-American Jazz artiste Taj Mahal with whom I have released the album ‘Mumtaz Mahal’. Also with dobro guitar and many more. The exposure such as an appearance on the Crossroads Guitar Festival-2004, organised by Eric Clapton, allows me to reach larger audience. I have released 20 fusion albums, of totally improvised music where I say my things in my language and they respond in theirs. I have just returned from the World Music Festival held in London with my own fusion band with the Rajasthani folk artistes called Desert Slide, which was a hit.
Wherever and with whomsoever I perform, I take care not to compromise with the purity of our music. And this, I may humbly say, is my greatest strength.
