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Ravi
Shankar:
An Interview With The World Renowned Sitar Master.
Preserving the tradition and nurturing the future of classical Indian music.
by Susna De, from the Summer 1999 issue.
“Vishwer Shilpie”(artist of the world) - these Bengali words are perhaps best epitomized by the legendary Bengali-Indian musician and composer, Ravi Shankar. Indeed, this music great has been revered as “the Godfather of World Music” by the Beatles’ George Harrison and praised by the media as being “one of the most important musicians of this century”. Such titles are well-deserved; in addition to popularizing Indian classical music in the West, Pundit Shankar has pioneered the realm of cross-cultural music in which he has harmonized the sitar with Western orchestras, merged Indian classical music with Bolshoi dancing, and written as well as performed Indo-Japanese works. Careful to avoid the term “fusion music”, Ravi Shankar has aimed to preserve the integrity and character of Indian classical music in his cross-cultural experiments.
From the early age of ten, Shankar has been involved in the introduction of Indian dance and music to the West. As part of a Paris-based Indian dance troupe formed by his eldest brother, Uday Shankar- an accomplished dancer in his own right - the young Shankar toured with the company across Europe both as a musician and dancer. It was in this troupe that he met Ustad Allauddin who, for seven years, taught Shankar the sitar in the traditional Indian guru-shishya method involving a very disciplined and guru-controlled study in an isolated environment. After gaining fame as a performer in India, Ravi Shankar advanced Indian classical music in the West working with noted artists, such as Yehudi Menuhin, Andre Previn, and George Harrison.
As a fellow Bengali, I had heard many stories about the renowned Pundit Ravi Shankar. These stories, perhaps slightly exaggerated, depicted his musical talent and drive. For example, when practicing, it was said that Ravi Shankar could go on for hours and hours and had to be reminded to eat or drink water. Also, rumor had it that he practiced in front of the mirror to avoid facial expressions that might distract the audience from the music itself. The prospect of speaking with Pundit Shankar, the legend himself, was slightly nerve-racking, but his gentle, humble and down-to-earth nature quickly put to rest any of my pre-interview jitters.
Though his achievements are legendary, Ravi Shankar is not a mere “legend,” a word linked to the past; rather at 78, Pundit Shankar continues to be a contemporary ground-breaking artist who preserves as well as furthers his culture and music into the global realm.
SD: Tell us how you started out in music and with the study of the sitar.
RS: Well, from the age of 10, I came to Paris with my brother's (dance) troupe, which you know perhaps, Uday Shankar. At that time I started playing the sitar in the group along with dancing and playing other instruments but I was not seriously involved in it [sitar], I was more of a dancer. It was only when Baba Allaudin Kahn who later became my guru...he joined the troupe of my brother to tour in Europe as a soloist along with the group. And that's when I started really my serious training (on the sitar) when I was 15, and then we went touring in Europe and England and after one year he went away. He only came for one year. By that time I was getting to be a good dancer and getting good critiques and all that. And I was not decided what I [would] do to play music or dance. But after he went away, it took me another almost two years to decide and I completely took the decision that I'll leave dancing, my brother's group and go to him in a remote village called Naihat. And that's what I did. And I studied with him for seven and a half years.
SD: You grew up during the Indian Renaissance, a time when many were discarding British Colonial Influence (e.g. Rabrinthanath Tagore, Nehru, Gandhi) and returning to traditional Indian culture. Did that era and ambience affect you and your interest in classical Indian music?
RS: I never had to really go back to my Indian roots, I have always been closely connected with our tradition, like a bridge. I do believe that the Indian people, especially abroad outside India, has this new surge of wanting to know their background and their culture and especially, I do find, that many of the younger generation. And there should be something against all the Indian films from Bombay, all the new movement of pop culture which has taken over Indian youth very strongly - there is nothing wrong with that, it is quite natural - but along with that there should be something that should give people some moments of peace and spiritual feeling which has always been there inside.
SD: When sending your daughter to a private school in India, both she and you noted that currently, Indian culture is very Westernized. What about the Indians in India. Is there a keen interest in classical music?
RS: Yes, there is. But you know, the classical music has always been limited to the class of educated people. It's like a high form of literature, it cannot be for everyone. That has always been the case, but since the independence, we have found that Indian culture has been more known... So I find that it is the same ratio as it is here: you cannot say that it is [classical music] popular in comparison to pop, rock or even jazz for that matter. But you always see that they have filled out houses, Pavarotti, or Domingo or whoever. In India also, classical music has its own group of listeners and it is growing - that is the main thing. It is growing more and more and the younger generation is getting more interested in it. I feel very happy about it.
SD: You no doubt have contributed to that interest.
RS: There have been a number of people propagating it [culture].
I give lectures to schools and colleges every year.
SD: What about the current level of interest from second and third generation Indians?
RS: I do feel that it is very natural, for the generation brought up
outside, to be fond of rap, pop or whatever but one shouldn't be anti-classical.
SD: It was a very strict teaching wasn't it?
RS: Absolutely, absolutely! Absolutely in the old traditional teaching of Guru-Shisho Parampan you know. He was a very hard task master of old principles and all that. You can imagine that after all this glitter and glamour and freedom and especially at that age - I was 18 and I had seen the world already many times over. And then to leave everything and go back to that hermit life of being a celibate, almost like being in the old ashramas under such a strict guru - what a strength of mind I had, because no one compelled me. No one told me, it was my own decision.
SD: Was it hard, as an Indian musician, to be accepted in the West and did you have to adapt or change at all?
RS: I was very honest to my music. You can try to visualize the advantages I had over all the [Indian] musicians is that those 7-8 years of my life in the West from childhood gave me an insight and understanding of the Western people at my age - their mind, their attitude, and their likes and dislikes of Asian things, and ignorance as well. So all that helped me and knowing French , English fluently with which I could communicate, I was the only musician who could do it and that's why I took the whole responsibility upon myself. It was whole different story [with me] because no musician could talk properly and explain anything - they were great musicians you know but I was the first one who could do that and I did it and I'm glad I did it for almost 45 years now.
SD: Did you have to change the music at all to please the Western audience?
RS: Not musically, not standard wise but of course what I did was "duration wise". Because in India the very few people who used to understand music, they sat down and they didn't care about time. One raga could be played or was played for one hour, two hours. That couldn't be possible in the West. That's what I did. I kept the proportion without spoiling the nature of the raga. Because ragas are not fixed items. There's nothing like five minutes or ten minutes or twenty minutes raga. The raga can be and has been performed by great artists for even (you know those old small records - 3 inches thick? Or long period records). It can be performed for three minutes to fifteen minutes to half an hour or one hour depending on the mood of the artist because it's not a fixed thing, it’s improvisation. So, I was very much aware of that not to give so much to the people in the West so that they could not take it or accept an alien music. And I used to make them understand, I used to talk to them and explain to them before you know, what raga this is, [whether] it is pertaining to early morning or late evening or whatever or spring season or rainy season and also show them the ascending and descending structures, the notes that it uses or it doesn't use and things like that helped them to understand and that's how I brought the [music] to them very quickly.
SD: What inspired you to perform and compose your cross-cultural music?
RS: Oh those are my compositions which have nothing to do with the old tradition of my
playing the sitar on the stage. I am a composer also. And that's why many people completely mix up my two different identities as a performer of classical traditional music and also as an openminded composer. I have attempted so many things from the last fifteen years in way of orchestration, in way of writing music scores for films, ballet and opera things like that - for radio, for television, making special musical pieces for long playing records. But one thing I want to tell you, make a note, that I have never tried to do fusion or cocktail or gimmick music. What I have always done is basically Indian, either Indian traditional, or contemporary, or even Indian folk. And I have used non-Indian instruments, I have used non-Indian musicians even but never tried to make a hodgepodge thing which I personally don't believe. But that is the big thing nowadays, you know, everybody is trying out a lot of new things and that is a very good thing. I am not saying anything [about that]. But I have not done it.
SD: Can you explain how you came to work with George Harrison?
RS: [he pauses then chuckles] In my long years of music almost 65 years, I have gone through phases, as a dancer, ... then to music. Went through the training in our traditional music and then started touring again all over the world. Almost for 45 years I've been popularizing all over. And went through different phases, first of all it was the hippie phase and George Harrison became my student in 1966. It all happened together at the whole hippie period. The young generation, the revolt and everything, the drugs and everything and that was the second phase when my sitar became very popular with the young generation. I was already well-known as a classical performer but that gave me a whole new thing as a popular artist. And George simultaneously was very much a fan of my music and the whole Indian thing. So he came from the world of Rock-and-Roll and pop music but he himself gradually changed into a very serious lover of the tradition of India in all forms, spiritual philosophy, music, everything. So that has been the connection between George and me. But me being an Indian born, as a Brahmin knowing our traditional ways, well being born into it as well as playing traditional music, for me it is always easy to go back to our past.
SD: Why is that?
RS: Because I see, myself, what the whole world is going through. It's worse today than ever before. There's the additional problem for having it [happen] so fast than what was the normal procedure for centuries, the whole drug scene and everything and all the freedom which has led to unfortunate sad incidences which is causing lots of problems. And to balance that, I'm not a preacher (I'm not saying anything against what they do) but I think that, like people take tranquilizers, medicines to be a comfort to the mental procedure, my album hopefully will provide an alternate path to comforting and placating the mind and its many concerns in these changing times.
SD: Could you describe your daughter, Anoushka's, involvement with your music?
RS: She is very, very talented. She is playing the sitar. She actually assists me nowadays everywhere where I am playing. She has been learning for a long time. She also is having piano lessons, western music. She is very talented. This was also a chance where I initiated her for the first time to assist me, to write down all the pieces that I was composing then and there. And sometimes to help me with conducting while recording is going on.
SD: Does she get nervous when performing with you?
RS: No. No she's “cool as a cucumber”!
SD: What can we expect from you in the future?
RS: Well, I have lots of plans. We might do this whole thing with a visual aspect of the stage, some people have suggested. I have some plans to bring some ballets which I did a few years ago that were shown in England and India. We'll see.
by Susna De, from the Summer 1999 issue.
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Susna De is currently finishing up her Master's degree in neurology and is about to embark on a degree in international health. Ultimately, she plans to leave the ivory tower and would like to work for the UN or the World Health Organization. In addition to collecting degrees, she is a photography enthusiast partial to people photography and is a big fan of the tennis pro, Boris Becker. Of Indian origin, she has been raised in many countries, including Saudi Arabia, England, and the US. She is a fanatic traveller who is addicted to living in and experiencing different cultures. Susna currently makes her home in Washington, DC. |
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