Ravi Shankar

Just came back from a live concert by the sitar maestro, Pt. Ravi Shankar. It was awesome. It was a great experience to listen to him play live and be in the presence of such a legendary genius. The venue was Hill Auditorium on the University of Michigan campus - supposedly an acoustically perfect auditorium. He played three compositions. The first one was ‘Jansammohini’ which we listened to in the foyer. It was followed by Raag Maarubihag. After the intermission, he played Raag Maj-khamaj that was mixed with many other Raags (my untrained ear could pick Raag Megh and Raag Yaman in the medley) and folk tunes. He experimented with different taals in that composition too. It was very well done. He plays with such fluency. Doesn’t seem like he is even thinking about what he is playing, it just flows. I couldn’t believe that he was playing that for over an hour. Time seemed to just fly away. The whole concert without counting the intermission was more than 2 hours and 15 minutes. He seemed very fit for a 84 year old man. Many of us can’t even sit in one position for more than 2 hours.

By the time we got Ashwini settled with her babysitter, battled with traffic and found parking, we were late by 15 minutes. The organisers had stopped latecomers from entering the auditorium and we had to wait outside till the first Raag was completed. I think that is a very good idea. People arriving late always disturb the performer as well as the audience. This policy should be implemented everywhere. I know they do it at most classical music concerts in US. Ashwini was asleep by the time we came home. She was happy with the babysitter; there were no problems. We should do this more often.