It was a night of soaring music as the two worlds of Hindustani and western classical music collided. As the rest of Hyderabad partied it out, a group of people huddled in the quaint outdoorsy environment of La Makaan in Banjara Hills and let the music speak.
Friday night saw A Celebration of Rhythm and Strings , organised by the Goethe-Zentrum and the Hyderabad Western Music Forum, in collaboration with La Makaan and Alliance Francaise. An enviable crowd turned up, despite the clawing heat.
The first segment was a western classical performance by John Marthand and his party. Drawing on the best of Mozart, the night opened with a violin solo of Mozart's sonata in G-major. With John accompanying on the piano, the music built up to a crescendo, shifting effortlessly between lively and melancholy. It was reminiscent of a Victorian-era waltz: one could almost see dapper men and women dipping and turning and swirling in time to the lilting notes.
A duet by Mozart dedicated to the summer season followed, but bad acoustics swallowed most of what would have otherwise been a creditable performance. The string quartet that rounded off the western classical slice fared much better. Featuring Ritu and Tyagaraj on the first violin, Paul and Sushil on the second, Sanjay on the viola and John on the cello, every section individually played was a melody by itself. The overall effect was one of effortless sweetness.
Seconds after the music ebbed, a set of tablas appeared on stage and the second half began. A slim kurta-clad man with blonde hair took centre stage and painstakingly said, “ Mein bahuth khushi hoon . Sorry I can't speak Telugu, so this will have to do.” Germany-based Florian Schiertz may not fit your stereotype of a tabla player, but once his fingertips touch the stretched surface of his instrument, it no longer matters. A postgraduate in Tabla and North Indian Classical Music from Rotterdam Conservatoire, this was Florian's first time playing in Hyderabad. He started off with a tabla solo. Mohammed Aslam Khan accompanied on the sarangi, and it only took seconds to set the mood as the notes flowed out. It was music to make one weep, and Florian's masterful rhythms added a haunting air to the richness of the sarangi.
La Makaan provided the perfect setting for the concert: the garden of a bungalow with massive boulders forming the backdrop of the stage and the cloying scent of incense sticks and earth competing for the senses. As Florian was joined by Pandurang Mutalik on the sitar and Shankar on the violin, the euphoric burst of music that followed brought the evening to a close.
