Aneesh Pradhan: Zakir Hussain’s legacy encourages us to innovate, anticipate and communicate

There will no longer be another concert season in India to which audiences can throng to listen to the expressive music of the tabla maestro Zakir Hussain. Tabla solo recitals, accompaniment to instrumental or vocal music or kathak, intercultural music projects, percussion ensembles, Hindustani-Carnatic dialogues, projects with philharmonic orchestras – from now, these will not bring to us the sonic tapestry that he wove into each performance through his instrument.

We will, of course, continue to witness music and dance performances. But he will not be present to regale listeners with his communicative and playful presentations.

Does that mean memories of him and his music will fade away with the passage of time? They most certainly will not. As with other geniuses who have already departed, trendsetters like him leave legacies for successive generations to make sense of and gain inspiration from. Going beyond the adulation that Zakir Hussain will continue to receive from his seniors, contemporaries, juniors and fans, students of music like me need to understand the contours of his legacy.

To make an attempt in this direction, one would have to step back to a time in history when the tabla player occupied a position in the social hierarchy of musicians and in the music-making process far removed from what we are accustomed to seeing today.

Until the mid-twentieth century, the performance and teaching of Hindustani music was pursued professionally primarily by those from hereditary musician and courtesan families. The social stigma associated with the practice of this music and its hereditary practitioners kept most others away from the serious study and practice of this music. Among the hereditary practitioners, male vocalists occupied the highest position followed by instrumentalists on the second rung and accompanists on the third. Women performers were also relegated to a lower category.

Tabla players were an integral part of the accompanists’ section, as the tabla accompanied vocal and instrumental music and dance. The versatility of the tabla player was equally put to test in informal gatherings that were often held on Fridays at one or the other musician’s or courtesan’s residence. Here, the tabla would also be heard as a solo instrument, one that had developed since the second half of the nineteenth century.

These jumma (literally, Friday) gatherings many a time acquired a competitive character in the form of dangals (literally, a wrestling match) with musicians throwing musical challenges at each other while also honestly acknowledging the artistry of those who shone on such occasions.

However, the success of a tabla player at these gatherings did not ensure a more respectable position in the social hierarchy of the musician community. The soloistic Hindustani tradition empowered vocalists, instrumentalists and dancers, to decide the repertoire for performances and accompanists like tabla and sarangi players had to provide rhythmic and melodic support accordingly.

On the financial side, soloists were usually paid a fee, which was then distributed among the performers with the soloist retaining the major share.

As for public acknowledgement of accompanists, this was not a norm at most times even when ticketed concerts were held in larger venues. It was much later that the names of accompanists were mentioned in newspaper advertisements or on gramophone record covers and discs.

Despite these challenges faced by tabla players, the art of tabla playing evolved since the second half of the eighteenth century and six major styles crystallised in the form of the Delhi, Ajrada, Lucknow, Farrukhabad, Banaras and Punjab gharanas, each of which had a distinctive technique and repertoire for tabla solo recitals. The stylistic features of these gharanas also influenced the nature of tabla accompaniment.

As performers, composers and mentors, numerous tabla players have contributed significantly to this checkered history of the instrument. A notable instance for which we have documentary audio-visual evidence is that of Ahmed Jan Thirakwa, who was the preeminent tabla player in the first half of the twentieth century.

In the following generation and one prior to Zakir Hussain, when concerts had moved to larger venues that seated several hundred people, his father Alla Rakha, a celebrated performer and guru of the Punjab gharana along with illustrious contemporaries like Kishan Maharaj and Samta Prasad of the Banaras gharana, through their recitals gave new dimensions to tabla accompaniment and solo presentations that captivated audiences.

There were other prominent younger tabla players who also added their perspective to existing styles. The list of such tabla players is a formidable one, but it was Alla Rakha and his musical universe that made it possible for Zakir Hussain to emerge as an important tabla player on the global stage since the 1970s. Alla Rakha did not belong to a family of hereditary musicians and had encountered several challenges before establishing his identity as one of the leading tabla players of his time.

However, for Zakir Hussain, it was the atmosphere he grew up in and his capacity to gauge the pulse of the moment that distinguished his work from all that had happened in the context of the tabla in the past. He had opportunities to practise and perform with the greats of Hindustani music like Ravi Shankar, Ali Akbar Khan, Shivkumar Sharma and Hariprasad Chaurasia, and even with a top-notch dancer like Birju Maharaj.

By the time Hussain travelled to the US, circumstances had changed and many more musicians from the West and from other non-Indian musical cultures were looking towards India.

Admittedly, the sound of the tabla was not new to non-Indian ears. Hindustani musicians had been travelling overseas since the last part of the nineteenth century, although we do not have information about the tabla players who may have accompanied these musicians during their concert tours.

There is also the rare case of British musicologist AH Fox Strangways taking note of the tabla while examining different aspects of Indian music in his book The Music of Hindostan published in 1914. But by the 1950s and 1960s the Western world had heard tabla players like Chatur Lal and Alla Rakha frequently, and in the decades to follow, the study of tabla repertoire became a serious pursuit even in the West and music scholars from this part of the world took note of this instrument, its role, and its repertoire.

In fact, Alla Rakha had even played an integral role in collaborative ventures between Ravi Shankar and violinist Yehudi Menuhin and in others with acclaimed band The Beatles and with ace jazz drummer Buddy Rich.

But it was Hussain’s innate curiosity, his talent to engage and his openness to converse and imbibe from other musical systems and instruments, and his ability to connect with audiences across generations and cultures, that contributed to making his intervention radically different from all that had transpired earlier. Not surprisingly, he became the perfect representative for Indian music in intercultural projects during this exciting phase in an altered global situation.

His exposure to multiple musical systems evidently influenced him greatly and the unique sound that he developed seems to have been the result of this interaction. He took that and ideas related to dynamics and tonal exploration even to performances within the realm of Hindustani music, with the result that his music became distinct even in the traditional sphere.

He also integrated influences from other sources with what he had inherited from his father in musical terms. The ease with which he negotiated complex rhythmic intricacies usually associated with Carnatic music is demonstrated here. He and thavil master AK Palanivel accompany mandolin prodigy U Shrinivas.

The way he absorbed compositions belonging to gharanas other than the Punjab gharana, demonstrate the catholicity of approach that he maintained right through his career. For him, compositions popularised by Ahmed Jan Thirakwa, Kishan Maharaj, Birju Maharaj, Wajid Hussain Khan (of the Lucknow gharana), or other greats, were all welcomed and given an interpretation that was very much his own. The playful character of his presentations even reminded some of the tabla virtuoso Nizamuddin Khan’s style.

Notably, the eclectic flavour in tabla solo playing had existed ever since the time of Munir Khan, who had inherited traditional repertoire of the Delhi, Ajrada, Lucknow and Farrukhabad styles, and disseminated this through a galaxy of disciples. In the case of Zakir Hussain, this eclecticism was possible not only because of his open-hearted acceptance of various influences, but equally because he was able to give it an aesthetic shape in performance that was original.

The latter could not have happened without the unusual mastery over the instrument. The coordination between the tabla or dayan (treble drum) and the dagga or bayan (base drum) would always astound listeners.

Here is a clip of him presenting repertoire that was closely identified with Habibuddin Khan, who was considered the doyen of the Ajrada gharana.

In the next clip, he gives his interpretation to a gat from traditional repertoire.

Added to this, was his understanding of the kind of sound he wished to produce from his instrument and the way he wanted listeners to engage with his music. Not surprisingly, therefore, he harnessed resources that the advances in public amplification systems offered to calibrate the sound to desired effect.

On the following track, he produces sounds that simulate the damru and shankh.

His quick-thinking and agile responses were also always on display in a vast range of musical settings such as his accompaniment on the next track with bansuri maestro Hariprasad Chaurasia.

Here is another clip with him accompanying the renowned santoor exponent Shivkumar Sharma.

His accompaniment to kathak was also distinctive as is demonstrated in his performance with the inimitable dancer Birju Maharaj.

Aside from his wizardry on the tabla, he also composed music for intercultural music projects, albums and feature films. The body of work he has left behind, thus, is more diverse than that of any tabla player who preceded him. His articulation of musical processes and communicating these to students and listeners at various fora were also elements that were largely missing in the previous generations of tabla players and even among most of his contemporaries.

The next clip is from a live concert recording of the original Shakti band (John McLaughlin on the guitare, L Shankar on the violin, Zakir Hussain on the tabla and Vikku Vinayakram on the ghatam) recorded in 1976.

His music for a song in the feature film Saaz can be heard here.

Over the past several decades, Zakir Hussain had become synonymous with the tabla, and there was arguably no other Indian musician in his generation who received the immense public recognition that he did nationally and internationally. He had his share of criticism from certain quarters. During his early career, many seniors and contemporaries considered his solo recitals as presentations that lacked substance in terms of traditional repertoire. As with his father, he too was regarded by these musicians as being efficient at delivering swift passages focusing on certain bols (literally words) from the tabla repertoire or being excessively mathermatical and nothing more than that. They felt his style as a soloist and accompanist was marked by gimmicks to please the gallery.

But it is obvious that he decided not to stray from the path he had chosen and gradually his music went on to influence most tabla players and several took to learning the instrument inspired by his musical genius. The turn of events catapulted him to prime position and instrumentalists, dancers and even some vocalists, longed to share the stage with him. In a sense, he was regarded the ‘main artiste’ in such situations by audiences and through publicity related to such events, although he played the role of an accompanist.

Many worship him as the god of rhythm and have even tried to emulate his music and his looks and manner. But along with the deep respect and admiration for him, it may be an opportune moment to consider the various challenges that he may have encountered through his journey with music just as others did at different levels before him and recognise his resilience and creativity in the face of these challenges.

The legacy he leaves behind would hopefully motivate us to look beyond the immediate. His urge to explore diversity, to innovate, to anticipate, to be responsive, and to communicate, will hopefully stimulate us as students of music. His legacy will also probably prompt listeners, concert organisers and other musicians to consider afresh the role that tabla players have played in the past and the way this has changed in recent times. Zakir Hussain’s music made the sound of the tabla a universal reality.

The final track included here features a tabla solo by Zakir Hussain accompanied by well-known sarangi player Sultan Khan and harmonium player Appa Jalgaonkar.

One of India’s leading tabla players, Aneesh Pradhan is a widely recognised performer, teacher, composer and scholar of Hindustani music. Visit his website here.