When Indian music aficionados are asked to list their top five jazz musicians, most of them would mention British guitarist John McLaughlin. Besides his sheer musical genius, this has a lot to do with his association with India, mainly through the path-breaking Indo-jazz fusion band Shakti in the mid-1970s.
McLaughlin turned 75 yesterday. One doesn’t know where he celebrated. He must have been having a silent dinner with family, friends and a few close musicians.
Most fans would have their own McLaughlin story. This is mine. I first saw Shakti live in New Delhi in 1984, only a day after attending their press conference. It was special because it was my first music assignment. Before that, I had suddenly discovered his Mahavishnu Orchestra through the album The Inner Mounting Flame.
The Shakti show was a revelation as McLaughlin, violinist L. Shankar, tabla wizard Zakir Hussain and ghatam maestro Vikku Vinayakram created magic for over two hours. The tunes ‘Bridge Of Sighs’ and ‘Face To Face’ were dazzling, and remain favourites. Soon, I bought their self-titled debut album and the extraordinary Natural Elements and A Handful Of Beauty.
Shakti took a break, but the McLaughlin magic continued. Mahavishnu Orchestra’s ‘Birds Of Fire’ and his solo album Belo Horizonte occupied plenty of listening time. His Friday Nights In San Francisco, with ace guitarists Al Di Meola and Paco De Lucia, took the following to a new level. With no musical training, I didn't know the difference between an acoustic guitar or electric guitar, between jazz-rock and flamenco. But I learnt those terms. Those days, there was no Google to discover new musicians. In New Delhi, there was nothing like Mumbai's Rhythm House, but there were many smaller stores, where one would just go by the owner’s recommendation.
An entire world of jazz guitar opened up, from Lee Ritenour and Larry Coryell to Pat Metheny and Bill Frissell. One also explored other jazz-rock bands like Weather Report and Return To Forever, besides Miles Davis’s pioneering ‘Bitches Brew’.
McLaughlin continued to be the favourite, as I acquired the albums Extrapolation, My Goal’s Beyond, and Electric Dreams and his collaboration with guitarist Carlos Santana on ‘Love Devotion Surrender’. In the 1990s, there was Que Alegria, that featured drummer Trilok Gurtu, and The Promise.
I met McLaughlin in 1997, just before he performed with flautist Pandit Hariprasad Chaurasia, Hussain and Vinayakram. Later, he teamed up with Hussain, mandolin genius U. Srinivas, kanjira player V. Selva Ganesh and singer Shankar Mahadevan as Remember Shakti.
At Rang Bhavan, McLaughlin and santoor legend Pandit Shivkumar Sharma played the ‘Shringar’ in raga Kirwani. The piece appeared on the 2001 live album Saturday Night In Bombay, but Remember Shakti never recorded a studio album after that, though it released DVDs. The death of Srinivas in September 2014 was a huge blow.
Over the past three years, McLaughlin has played twice in Mumbai with his band The 4th Dimension, featuring keyboardist Gary Husband, bassist Etienne Mbappe and Mumbai-based drummer Ranjit Barot. Both shows were packed.
What's unique about McLaughlin is the way he has explored various musical cultures from Indian to European to Latin American to North American music. Yet, for us, he remains more Indian. In fact, he was given the name Mahavishnu by his spiritual guru Sri Chinmoy. He follows Indian spirituality and yoga. And while he stands and plays mainstream jazz, he has sat cross-legged Indian style with Shakti and Remember Shakti. One won’t be surprised if he had Indian food on his birthday. Have a great year, John.
The author is a freelance music writer
