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Innovation in Indian music
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Saskia Rao-de Haas' innovations on violincello have given a whole new perspective to the instrumental music.
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LILTING EXPERIMENT: Saskia Rao-de Haas plays Hindustani classical music on her modified cello.
IT IS not simply an exposition of playing on the violincello; it is an exploration of a totally alien medium of art like the Hindustani classical on a singularly Western instrument, it is an experimentation that has yielded the desired result to Saskia Rao-de Haas, the Danish cello artiste who strums Hindustani classicals on her modified cello. And that is indeed an achievement. "The intricate nuances of Hindustani music made it mandatory for me to refashion this instrument,'' says she, pointing out to the cello which is slightly smaller in size than its original. "Basically a baroque instrument, it calls for an additional playing string and ten sympathetic (taraf) strings to give a resonance to the gamakas which are an integral part of Indian classical medium.'' The cello is
the western ensemble, played sitting on a chair going by its unwieldy structure. But here is an artiste who squats on a taquat on the stage in a typical Indian fashion and places the instrument close to her body even as the lower and broader part rests on the ground. Holding the modified violincello is in itself an acrobatic act! Yet, Saskia handles it as if its feather-light. "My playing cello ever since the tender age of seven-plus has made me take to the otherwise large instrument with considerable ease. Even as I execute the alaap, the raags with all their swars, I never exert an effort much less feel it. Yes, I concentrate to the core and that perhaps reflects in my face,'' she admits. Trained for and in western jazz, symphony, etc., from childhood, she acquired the ability to analyse various music systems across the globe and develop an individual interest, which led to the present innovation. "Indian music has always had a global presence from yonder years. I had the opportunity to hear and see a number of great Hindustani classical singers and instrumentalists while abroad. There was an awakening somewhere within me to try my hand at a different cultural milieu in the form of music. Improvisations, so inherent in Indian music, was like a challenge to me to give a new meaning to this medium. I came like all other foreign students on a scholarship to India in 1994 to study music. And the rest is history,'' she recounts.
Well, the rest was not just plain past. She came across sitar maestro, Shubendra Rao of Myhaar gharana in whom she found an ideal life-music partner. Apart from her solo concerts, together, the couple play their own compositions apart from the regular traditional Hindustani concerts. They have come a long way in the sense of blending their compositions with contemporary music "with a soul which is very Indian juxtaposed to the modern musical theme/subject,'' she explains. Saskia is averse to term their experimentation as `fusion' as to her it doesn't make much sense especially within the framework of serious classical music.
To a remark that her violincello has a timbre akin to the Indian veena rather than the Indian violin, she readily sees the similarity in sound. "Yes, we did a beautiful experiment working together with the veena maestro, Suma Sudhendra. It was rhythm at its best. The range and pluck of my cello is very close to the veena, though there are equally as many differences in aesthetic and technical aspects.'' Coming to her playing style on the modified cello, Saskia has a lot to convey both about the instrument and the variations it offers which either restrict or enhance her performance. "The intervals in Western are standardised unlike in Hindustani where there are any number of finer variations which emerge from time to time as one plays a particular tune. The different shrutis have to be discovered even as the finer intonations are executed with care and concentration. I usually start off with a fairly long alaap to get myself totally involved, to get my focus right. Once this is done, and I'm immersed in playing it, I'm sure the experience will carry my performance through. So there is a lot of soul and heart in strumming-not just practice and play.''
Her early tutelage under the cello virtuoso, Tibor de Machula and later study of the Indian classical music in the conservatory of Rotterdam under Koustav Ray and Pandit Hariprasad Chaurasia have awakened the finesse in her as a musician while a Masters in Ethnomusicology from Amsterdam equipped her with the necessary scholarship to appreciate and acquire the wealth of Indian (Hindustani) music. With these embellishments and by her own diligent discovery, Saskia has absorbed the subtleties of north Indian style of playing which pour forth in her performances.
She is optimistic about the future of such an instrument as the cello when she states, `The sonority of this instrument can give even the smallest musician a feeling of ease to teach and learn. There'll come a day, when Indian music on this predominantly western cello will catch up with the other part of the world.''
RANEE KUMAR
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