“Hamne shaam dekhi hi nahin” (I didn’t get to see the evenings). You understand you are in the presence of a highly focused musician as she looks at you with genuine bewilderment when you light-heartedly ask if she watches films in her spare time. “Spare time? I have never found any in all my nearly 70 years,” she laughs. One of the senior most exponents of the Jaipur Atrauli tradition, Padma Talwalkar has had the distinction to learn from three gurus from different schools of Hindustani classical music.
She is a disciple of none other than Mogubai Kurdikar. She also learnt from Pt Gajanan Rao Joshi, a repository of Gwalior, Jaipur and Agra gharanas and from Pt Nivrittibua Sarnaik of Kirana and Jaipur gharana. She literally lives and breathes music.
Wife of “Taal Yogi” Pt Suresh Talwalkar, mother of arguably the most talented tabla player of his generation, Satyajit Talwalkar, and Sayani Talwalkar, a rare lady percussionist, Padmatai, as she is affectionately called, also has an extended family of students.
These include 2016 Yuva SNA awardee Yashashvi Sirpotdar, Gauri Pathare, making waves in the world of vocal music today, Ankita Deole, Rasika Garud and Shruti Athavle. In fact, it would not be wrong to say that her achievements as a musician are equally matched by her stature as a guru. She has carefully nurtured several young students who regard her as a mother figure, and whose training has matched the grooming she herself received, now nearly two generations ago, in the traditional Guru Shishya parampara.
Padma was born Padma Sadashiv Joglekar. She has two siblings but was the only one who took up music. Talking about her early life, she recalls, “Every day we would go to the nearby temple of Akalkot Swami in Pune, and I used to sing there. My father was a deeply spiritual man and he influenced me deeply.”
Excerpts from a conversation conducted at New Delhi’s India International Centre where she performed recently.
I have noticed you fold your hands before you start your concert...
I feel before you start your work, your “gaana bajaana”, you should remember your Gurus. Remembering your God is a different thing, do that too, but the people who took you to where you are today have to be thanked. It’s very necessary to invoke your parents, Gurus and seek their blessings. If I don’t do “pranaam”, it’s incorrect. Surrender is necessary; your own efforts are important of course, but without the blessings it doesn’t work. I feel today artists don’t realise this; “voice hai, intellect hai, lekin bina taalim” (you may have the voice and the intellect but without training there is nothing). Your voice and intellect is not really acquired, you were born with it, so it’s nothing to be proud of. Some people don’t even take their Guru’s name. It sounds a very small thing but actually it’s a very big thing. My gurus are not around today, but I am still a student.
When you are training with your guru, you are literally only copying what you hear. If your memory is good, your voice dexterous, you will be able to pick up faster. But when to use the phrase, the weight, the inflection – you learn later how to correctly use the phrase, in its best context. As you keep singing, you keep understanding what you were taught. Your own intellect can only grasp what it is capable of taking in; the guru has so much more. It’s like getting only a drop from an ocean. Ek raag ko kharaa karna, uska mahaul banaaa, kitna mushkil hai (to create the edifice of a raga, create its unique ambience is a very difficult thing) – you only realise this as you evolve as a musician and understand how much more there is to a raga.
Tell us about your gurus
I was 19 when I went to Mai (Mogubaiji) and she was 70. Earlier, I had learnt from Pt Pinparkhare for about 10 years. I learnt from him in the morning before school, and then in the evening after school. If I ever missed a day, he would come to my home to ask why I hadn’t come.
When I went to Gajanan buwa, he was even older than Mai. It was so inspirational, even at that age, all they did was music. They had no life other than music. No question of thinking “aaj mood nahi hai, aaj nahi gaate” (Today, I am not in the mood to sing). Kishori tai (Kishori Amonkar) once said she had never experienced the leisure of an evening, implying, every evening, without fail, the tambooras would come out and the music would begin. That became my life too. Unless you sacrifice everything else, the “tej” (luminosity) does not come into your music.
How do you remember your training days?
When I went to Mai, she taught me a difficult raga, Gauri for nine months. Only Gauri. In my time of learning, one did not question, or talk to the guru. “Bahut muskil tha, voh time beetaana”. (It was very difficult to live that time) I was used to singing only in “vilambit ektaal” (slow 12 beat cycle), she taught me only teen taal (16 beat) initially. God! it was tough. Her singing was quite structured, quite fixed, from “sam” to “sam”, (first beat of the cycle); yet was also so melodic, so much “golaayi” (roundedness). Mai (Mogubai) ka pura aavartan ka gaana tha (Mai taught how to build up the full circle of the taal, not only pieces.
I started living in Bombay to learn from her; I stayed with family near by. I used to go only in the mornings to her, but about two years after I had started learning, after she got her Padma Bhushan award, she asked me if could accompany her at a concert. I got very flustered, I had barely learnt from her. So she said, come in the evenings too, and you will quickly pick up. So I sang behind her, in Kolhapur, Pune and Bombay. It was such a unique honour.I was so lucky I had three such Gurus, great human beings as well as fine artistes.
Etiquette was such, that no one could enter the room during your training. I was lucky that Kishori tai herself permitted me to sit with her during her training; those days Kishori tai used to be learning too. “Meri to lottery lag gayi”. (It was like winning a lottery). I would then learn about an hour and a half from Mai, and then around noon, I would go to Kishori tai to learn. Though they were mother and daughter, each had her own style. Both never left a musical sentence incomplete. I have sat behind Kishori tai and sung innumerable concerts, travelled all over with her. Really, it was such a rare privilege. Her imagination, her development of raga was great, “gaana ek baat hota hai, soch kuch aur hai” (singing is one thing, the conceptualising behind the singing, another). She would just expand between “re and pa” for over an hour! She loved me a lot; she would always say I am not your guru, you learn from Mai.
Gajanan ji too was a remarkable musician. His learning was tremendous. He knew maybe 300-400 ragas really well; he would wake up at 3:30 am every day. Then would continue to sing till 9, have a break then again sing till 12, then rest, walk, then again sing in the evening. I used to travel to reach him, had to change two trains to reach him, sometimes stay overnight, I learnt about 6-7 years from him.
I also absorbed a lot indirectly from Pt Bhimsen Joshi, Pt Kumar Gandharva and Ustad Amir Khan. I regard them as my gurus too, as I took from them by listening to them.
Among your contemporaries, who do you listen to?
Pt Ulhas Kashalkar, “kamaal ka gaana hai unka” (His singing is amazing).
Neither of your children took to singing. How do you feel about that?
Both my children are into music; it doesn’t matter that they don’t sing. I am happy about that. Satyajit was always very creative; he started learning from the age of three. When he was given one “tukra” (piece), he would practice that then create something else. He is also very musical.
Some of my students have been learning from me for over 25 years, they come home to learn. It’s best to learn as much as you can before marriage. As a guru you should give everything you can; “dena hai aise, na kee aise”(she gestures with an open palm and then a half open palm).
Tell us your views about the now diminishing gharana system, and the changing “shakl” (face, features) of ragas
The gharana system is breaking down, one is influenced by others music. Ragas too are changing over the years, it’s inevitable. The structure of singing, not meditating on a note, that is changing too and that disturbs me. The aim of our music is to connect the spirit with the divine; I have to be able to sing for my inner satisfaction before I could convey something through my music. Music should be something that lingers with the listener, something that is not quickly forgotten. You should not only sing what people want to hear, you should sing for yourself. Only then do you create something worth listening to.
(Padma Talwalkar will perform in Pune on 29th September)
What to do and not to do
I remember starting to learn from Tai when I was five – one of my first memories is learning the “aaroha avroha” (ascent and descent of notes of a raga) of raga Yaman for six months! That’s how she taught me the definition of patience. The learning process was always difficult with her as a guru, but as time passed I realised she gave me the maturity to understand the “swar”, the “samwaad” (joining) of two “swars”, and the importance of the purity of music. I am really fortunate to have had her as a guru for more than 25 years and I am still learning. Another important part of my “taalim” was to have accompanied her on the stage for more than 200 concerts; this too was critical to learn how to present in concert. From her, I first learnt what to do in music, and now I am learning what not to do in music!
(Vocalist Yashasvi Sirpotdar on her guru)
I thank God for giving me such a guru!
‘Her music has shaped me’
My earliest memories are of music, my mother and father’s music. She really moulded my personality from the start, as perhaps all mother’s do, but in my case, her music has shaped me also as a musician. Understanding the nuances of music has helped me enormously as a percussionist. I believe from a very young age, my constantly drumming on surfaces had convinced my mother that my interest was more in percussion than vocal music. I am really blessed to have such wonderful parents from whom I have received so much.
(Satyajit Talwalkar on his mother)
