What the F. A. Q.

When & where did you start learning the Sitar?

In December 2001 at the Sri Aurobindo International Centre of Education, Puducherry, wherein I was a student until 2006. I was running 17, when I began my journey with the Sitar.

Under whom did you first start learning the Sitar? Your Teacher / Guide / Guru / Mentor?

I started learning under Pt. Basab Sen, who was back then and still is a teacher at the Sitar Section of the S. A. I. C. E.

Ideally the Divine is my Guru! For the cultural world outside of S. A. I . C. E. that recognises me as a performing artist on Sitar, I mention to them of Pt. Basab Sen as my Guru. This has been done to an extent to cater to a certain limitation within the scope to address to certain audiences. But this is not just about convenience alone, because, at a glance I haven’t found any other in Sitar, especially as I have interacted with a few of them, to have such an opening to the Divine. I have taken this ‘liberty’ of calling Basab Sen as my Guru, as I have truly experienced, the manifestation of a sincere will for True Progress during my learning with him, which I see as a Divine expression through his realisations with the Sitar.

There are a few other individuals whom I take them as my Gurus in the manner as described above, however they do not play the Sitar.

The reason for this hesitation of concretising the image of a Guru so far, stems from my background at the Ashram. As I cannot explain in brief, I have elaborated a few details of my life to better understand the hesitation mentioned above in Sitar Initially…

What drew you towards the Sitar so late in life?

Curiosity! My musical mind was already significantly developped playing the Bansuri earlier as I learnt its technique and a sizeable portion of Pt. Pannalal Ghosh’s music with help of my teacher at S. A. I. C. E – Bryce Grillinton. Added to that Pt. Kartick Kumar’s introducing me to the system of developing a Rāg as he had high hopes that I would pursue the Bansuri and not the Sitar! With a dedicated approach to the system introduced to me I wanted to express my musical thoughts on a wider range sonically as is befitting, which wasn’t available to me on the Bansuri. And therefore I took the plunge of learning the Sitar from scratch at 17. And many practices fit in beautifully in my progress only because, subconsciously in all probability, I’ve registered the Sitar of the maestros as played back by my folks at home for their listening pleasure, ever since I can remember 🙂🙏

So is it more difficult to start late? How did you cover up TIME in this competitive world?

Well let’s just say that I “bent Time” to my comfort 😂 Just joking… See it’s important to understand a few things about learning in general, let alone Sitar or anything else. Sitar is an application, not the entire learning! It is probably the toughest to learn among other instruments both physically & musically, considering a wide range of musical thought, the physics involved in it’s structure and material and your bringing it under control in tuning it right. But yet it is not everthing. For example, what must be the physics practicals that went through my mind while applying myself to the techniques of Pole Vault, Discus, Shot Putt, Swimming, Gymnastics etc. What must be the rigour that I put my body through training in some of those disciplines in comparison to my training on the Sitar which doesn’t even need 20% of the strength, flexibility, endurance etc? 😀 So if you have gone through physical education from age 4 and your body is READY, then I don’t see “starting early” as the only way to play it professionally. Haven’t I demonstrated my professionalism in this short time?

It is only unfortunate that the cultural world has tried its best to suppress me as my rise would finish all its narratives about starting young and forever worshipping a human Guru, making this whole drama of a huge sacrifice, only because there are many beneficiaries for whom this story sells 😂😂😂 Not to get ahead of myself, but as an example do compare my form in 2010 at age 25 as shown above Versus Niladri Kumar in the same genre. Do you really feel that his starting out at age 4 and playing for some 25 years before I even touched my Sitar for the 1st time, has given him any significant edge over me? With years in the field, one builds contacts and has enough time to settle down with teams around them, just like any other profession. The only clear advantage that I see is that of having enough management setup to tackle all the negative PR machinery working against your creative ability. STARTING EARLY DOES NOT DEFINE YOUR ABILITY TO PLAY 🙂

Why do you not associate yourself with any particular Gharana?

I have been guided primarily by 3 incredibly knowledgeable masters in music & musicology – Pt. Basab Sen, Pt. Kartick Kumar & Pt. Shyamal Chattopadhyay; each connected in one sense (Maihar background) and also very different at the same time with regards to their taalim from other schools of music as well. The summary to this can be found under Sitar Integrally.

Undoubtedly this is my unique privilege to have been exposed to such a wide repertoire in such a short time relatively, but at the same time it also made it more difficult for me(!) to finally concise all the nuances into my musical expression – a homework that every artist must go through given that they have learnt from different sources. Therefore I was forced to look at the more integral aspect to Sitar rather than settling down with the approach of one single Gharana.

Gharana as a styling in music, in all its glory and aesthetics, can only be a subset and not the entire scope of your instrument / medium. This is why the great Baba Allaudin Khan incorporated a wide range of ideas which he found suitable for a cohesive interpretation, thus inculcating a beautiful variety among his disciples – Ravi Shankar, Annapurna Devi, Ali Akbar Khan, Nikhil Banerjee, Bahadur Khan, Timir Baran and others, each unique in their own musical expression. This was in stark contrast to the other ‘Gharanas’ that ensured a very similar approach on average, of all their exponents, thereby projecting their collective identity.

So Baba in fact went past the regular ambition of trying to create a limited identity to portray the notion of Gharana, thus breaking free from the shackles in what I can only experience it as some kind of spiritual awakening – to be open to music beyond Gharana, enhancing global possibilities 🙏 And this I feel happened because of his personality. He was not born to a Gharanedaar lineage, and therefore set upon himself an impossible task (to the ordinary back in the 19th to early 20th centuries) of learning so deeply from so far and so wide, bearing all the insults everywhere that he was not welcome, all in pursuit of learning 🙏 To sustaining himself as a court musician, finally settling down in Maihar, and yet, moving ahead with the times in not imposing any limited identity on his students’ varied musical interpretations but rather only encouraging each of them to have different expressions from each other, by dedicating himself to such an exceptional vision in teaching music! The only instance of him using the Maihar tag was to form the unique Maihar Band – an unprecedented effort in Music, wherein he specifically taught physically handicapped individuals and training them to play his compositions in orchestral renditions 🙏 Progress Personified. Period.

Therefore it is indeed sad to know that musicians are ignorantly identifying themselves as exponents of the Maihar Gharana. Musicologically this makes absolutely no sense to me. I do not blame those who are less fortunate and are forced to describe a certain identity while falling prey to stupid marketeers who still think rather backwardly in terms of it being a strategy for better promotion! I mean just think about it that if a lay listener cannot even relate to some fancy name as the Gharana mentioned in the bio which they hear for the 1st time, then what must be the plight of ardent fans who put themselves through the same lecture for over 30 years 😂 Just imagine you shared a chai with them back in the greenroom as they warmed you up to the mood of what they might play onstage, and then you have to be publicly told about their greatness before performance 😂😂 This IS how junk marketing gets when it has no creative freshness to it.

How do you see music, as an artist representing India culturally, with your being empanelled with the I. C. C. R. – the nation’s highest cultural body?

I’m grateful to receive this recognition back in 2017 based on the merit of my performances, although with 3 years passed (not counting the lockdown in 2020) I still await the first instance of my being invited to any cultural delegation abroad or any ICCR related activity in our own country!

Some food for thought… If you bring in the ‘cultural’ angle, then why do you only try to associate yourself with the descendants of those who were court musicians to the kings, glorifying a certain Gharana in the process?? Why not think about the temples where they played the Veena centuries before those invasions, and possibly even before the 1st instance of music as an entertainment to any king? Wherein a systematic approach to practice may have already existed? Today if you give me an instrument and no teacher, and if I’m keenly motivated, won’t I attempt to learn it by myself? Formulate my own practices, developing which, it might sound music to people’s ears? Then, wouldn’t I have gone within me to educate myself by seeking, synonymous to the Vedic Knowledge? Isn’t that closer to our true culture – the Sanātana Dharma?

Knowing the history is important in understanding our culture. Highlighting just one section of it and not its entirety, merely as convenience or to gain a personal advantage, does not do justice to our culture. That said I’m not an expert in every history of our land, but I do particularly enjoy looking up for facts every now and then, especially in Sitar. As a practitioner of Sitar, it is indeed interesting to have heard so many stories from our Gurus pertaining to music, such as Ragas and how their treatment differed between different masters and why a certain thinking came about.

And having created the SiGui, I now find myself uniquely to be a character in the history of Sitar quite by chance!! I did not target such an ambition, but simply went along a progressive thought and was blessed with a certain realisation whose manifestation was unprecedented among all Sitar players before me! Because they were stuck only with a certain idea of our ‘culture’…

Yes! Tell us more about the SiGui. How did you come up with it? How do you envision its progress / development vis-à-vis the mainstream? And please don’t bring up those controversies so far(!), as the world is anyway stupid enough to see all the proofs and yet remain so silent only thanks to your being relatively young and the lack of support by the big names! Tell us about the more progressive side 🙂

Lol 😂 It’s true that I would like to talk about the other aspects to SiGui. As I’ve already pointed out about the lack of sustainable support towards my playing Sitar as a culturally accepted instrument, because of my starting at 17 which would kill all those narratives for those who started out young and their huge sacrifices(!) in leaving everthing else to ‘achieve’ in music(!); so not getting enough justice for the troubles against the SiGui is not so shocking to me now 🙂

As I came up with this idea years ago, as mentioned before, to expand the range of the playing notes in the bass strings because the fret design in the currently played Sitar is ILLOGICAL to put it quite bluntly. Other than this, to be able to play triads and more, I also experimented with tuning of the strings as different from the traditional setting for tuning the Sitar, Surbahar, Veena etc, which don’t execute triads or more notes together as harmonies similar to western instruments. Incidentally the way I have tuned the strings of the SiGui is also not like the setting on a Guitar and therefore unique as my own musical interpretation, although this is a step closer to bridging the gap between the fingering techniques used on a guitar, never done before on the Sitar due to the Sitar’s sheer size. And likewise the pulling or the ‘Meend’ technique of the Sitar which is a subject by itself and is never done on the Guitar or any other western instrument, except for those trivial effects generated for some fun by the topnotch guitarists! When they have to pull 5 notes in combination producing musical idioms instead of just some random bend for effects(!) is when they will realise what pulling is all about! Funny that as a Sitar player, I keep getting these random ads of pros teaching you how to bend on the guitar! They may be great for their fingering in shifting on strings, which I truly appreciate, but THEY DON’T KNOW A THING ABOUT BENDING only because their instrument won’t allow them to 😂 They NEED my SiGui or Sitar or Veena to learn the REAL BENDS…

So these were some of my thoughts when I had started executing my plans. But ever since I got my Surbahar and I decided to look up some history on the family of similar instruments with their ancestor the Veena, I’ve actually come up with an eye-opening revelation:

As I’ve described above my design of the SiGui frets that is more LOGICAL than the existing design on a Sitar, I now feel that my fret design should have been established by 1900s or definitely by the 1950s. Any guesses about this seemingly self-effacing suggestion?

The answer lies in history. The modern development of Sitar I broadly understand it to be from the 1800s upto 1950s. But what was it like, before this era? What was its relevance with respect to the music, dance, vocalist and other instruments? I’m skipping extensive details that can be always found in the colossal bodies of work published so far regarding the Sitar’s history. But to understand its essentials in the context of my SiGui:

The Veena as we know in its 7-string setting existed as per Natyashastra, which is long before the Mughal invasions. The Veena was already established as a solo performing instrument. The Sitar during the period of invasions (not its only version) upto the 1800s was known to be a minor instrument accompanying sufi, ghazals etc, and therefore it did not have the 7-string setting – that of the Veena back then, until only in the 19th-20th century where the bass strings were added to the existing model to encompass the system of Alaap (Dhrupad) & the approach to playing compositions (Gatkari) in an “all in one instrument” approach. In one instance, Baba Allaudin Khan told Pt. Ravi Shankar to add Kharaj or the bass strings, while there is the other well known instance of Utd. Abdul Halim Jaffer Khan who also extensively exploring the use of bass strings, although both hailed from different Gharanas. Another significant source to explore this Kharaj-Pancham setting was Pt. Nikhil Banerjee. Ofcourse one must not forget Utd. Mushtaq Ali and some others as well who have played Kharaj-Pancham before Pt. Ravi Shankar, although on a slightly different proportion / materials in the structure, compared to the Sitars of Pt. Ravi Shankar, Utd. Abdul Halim Jaffer & Pt. Nikhil Banerjee as mentioned above whose instrument characteristics are closer to what we play today. The prehistory to the 20th Century Sitar are also discussed in my online talk with Souravbrata Chakraborty – a well respected exponent of the Surbahar & the Sitar, today, and moreover also having the distinction of knowing an accurate account of the history, both, from his Gurus as well as his academic pursuits at the Rabindra Bharati University in Kolkata.

So now what concerns us with regarding to the SiGui angle is the explanation of why the logic behind the Sitar frets is lacking so far, and why my designs should have logically been achieved long before I came up with such a design:

The Veena as we know has always had flat, horizontal frets, and also mostly their being immovable(!) which also implies the level of an engineering marvel to get the height and lengths of the strings with respect to the frets so accurate 🙏 No wonder the sophisticated system of presenting Alaap existed from so long ago! This, to me, is not just its music, but its combination with science to achieve a certain resonance whose effect nurtures our body & mind in an integral manner. The idea of feel holistically charged existed long back as part of our culture, and it’s not to be confused with the modern day marketing gimmicks such as sound healing & music therapy 😂😂 Please note that I’ve myself experienced this phenomenon whenever there was the occasion of my identifying an environment conducive to enhancing my Sitar performance, such as the right help in the sound and the accompaniment to my expression. People came and told me afterwards on how refreshed they felt, even when they did not understand the nuances of the music! This is our culture that goes beyond a certain temporary excitement to a more lasting positivity in our being.

So one can imagine why the Sitar took so many centuries to be developed and to reach the stage of a solo instrument, hailing from its predecessor that existed as an accompanying act. But then there was something special about the Sitar despite its ‘non-classical’ background, was that it had semi-circular frets (the curvature has had many changes over time). So the inimmitable special effect that the Sitar brought was the whole art behind the subject ‘Meend’ or the transveral bends as we know, other than its readiness to play faster paced compositions as opposed to a Veena. On Veena the transversal bends existed in a very minor way and in matters of speed, its in no comparison with the faster paced compositions of the Sitar! On the Sitar one could explore it more dedicatedly in playing ‘songs’ that did not require the entire range of notes of a Veena, as opposed to the bass strings adding to the technical complexity in fingering, stroking as well as tuning like in the case of Veena.

I’m further skipping the very special role of how a Surbahar came as a midway path to playing Veena’s & Sitar’s ‘Shaili’ integrally and the introduction of the tarabs groundbreakingly for the 1st time since the 1830s after which the Sitar changed drastically in incorporating the same settings albeit the size of a Surbahar.

Therefore I consider it a remarkable effort on part of the 1st Kharaj-Pancham Sitar exponents to have incorporated the ancient Veena 7-string system and added to it the specialty of the older Sitar in its transversal bends formulating a richer system in interpreting traditional classical music.

While so much was researched in terms of structure, the conditioning of the wood, evolving from the Tumba / soundbox made of solid wood transformed to a lighter and better resonating Tumba made of gourd, the better optimisation of its size and length; there is ONE big blunder or rather “half a big blunder”! The curvature of the frets were justified “back then” for their novel approach to ‘Meends’ / transversal bends on the main string, BUT WHAT WAS THE PURPOSE of the downward curvature curving back on the inner side of the fret board (near chikaris / drone strings)? The older Sitar one can justify its role to merely accompany the songs and play sprightly / ‘drut’ compositions needing no bass strings. But in the 19th & 20th centuries with the inclusion of the Kharaj / bass, why is that half a shape not conducive to playing those bass strings ESPECIALLY KNOWING that on the Veena, paradoxically, one did play the whole range of bass including chromatic frets SINCE TIME IMMEMORIAL? 😂😂😂 And to further expose this stupidity, I’ve already successfully demonstrated the extension of the bass strings range on the SiGui back in 2016, which has also been mentioned by TedX and other media in their nationwide and worldwide reach 😂😂😂 So in my pointed question to these so-called cultural specimens:

Let us assume that they do not consider adding guitar-like fingering techniques to their idea of culture and not necessarily the REAL culture itself; WHAT IS PREVENTING THEM, from incorporating my design of the SiGui frets and standardising them in place of your ILLOGICAL Sitar frets, ESPECIALLY since it’s over 4 years that I’ve published my work? SIMPLY THEIR EGO in their NOT being able to DIGEST the fact that Soham Munim, having no lineage in Sitar & a product of Sri Aurobindo Ashram Puducherry, from the SOUTH of India has demonstrated the IMPROVEMENT to an existing fallacy in Sitar that uses the NORTH INDIAN system of classical music. AND I’M MYSELF TELLING THEM that they don’t have to play elements of chordal western music with my improved frets design, AND YET, WHAT IS PREVENTING THEM TO JUST STICK TO THE TRADITIONAL APPROACH of a Veena with your Sitar having not just chromatic frets (already established before me) but also 👉 the Kharaj / bass range extended over the entire fretboard as per my successful demo? So as one can see there is absolutely NO LOGICAL BASIS for such a redtape against my genuine efforts so far.

Not so long ago, when I was visiting an IIT, in order to park my vehicle, I tried to shift a bike that was parked in an angle. In the process I dropped the helmet that was hanging from its handle. A faculty living on campus, immediately tried to scold me saying that I should not touch his friend’s bike and that I should look at other options to park. I believe that we both had our point of views, but it never came to discussing those! As he raised his voice further, onlookers tried to figure out what was the big deal really. And in that moment of excitement he blurted out, “You even dropped his helmet. What if it got damaged?” 😂😂😂😂 At this point I just couldn’t control my laughter and said, “Sir, if the helmet is damaged falling from a little over 1m in height, then of what use will it be to protect the rider?” 😂😂😂😂 And the bike owner did in fact reach there to tell me that it was ok and that not to worry about it! All this was just too funny as that grumbling faculty suddenly disappeared! I’m sure as an assistant professor in the physics department he is well qualified for his job, and that this was one of those moments when he just got carried away!

Similarly I DO NOT THINK THAT EVERYONE in the cultural world is inadequate or less learned. Maybe it is those individuals, however highly acclaimed, who are not in the right frame of mind to just consider my point of view let alone appreciate my merit, by way of logically reviewing the facts. At the end of the day, I ONLY have my work to do the talking, as I don’t have any degrees to flaunt from any premier institutes – neither in music nor in physics! And yet there are instances of individuals from both these worlds who have looked COMPLETELY RIDICULOUS in PUBLIC, in trying to throw their attitudes at me 😂😂😂😂

After so much passion & such positively ‘logical’ research that you’ve put into your Sitar playing, it’s strange that you haven’t got the due ‘acknowledgement’ as you mentioned, let alone any big recognition…

Towards the merit in my research & practice, except for some rare instances so far, I have been systematically deprived of a simple acknowledgement from this cultural world resulting in my getting sidelined for years with my having to struggle with no respectable income from music when there were opportunities, let alone a thriving career. It is only thanks to my personal benefactors Madhukar Munim & Co., that I could manage to receive food & shelter all these years. I cannot expect them to compete with PR machineries, that are promoting out and out some select individuals, including all their negative propaganda towards non-promoted artists in desperately trying to influence audiences in favour of those promoted individuals in those PR agencies’ interest. Moreover, is this disproportionate image of my mounds of progress in Sitar vs my little success in any way fair & acceptable to this world? Strangely, it is not the nation at large, but a few powerful individuals, through their sheer influence, who are ‘allowed’ to professionally damage so many potential competitors only because they can’t cope up with their own 🤳👉insecurities👈📸. And just look at their confidence in amassing a large number of supporters even when there is ample technology and a general awareness to provide transparency in so many matters. Digital technologies were developed to facilitate professions that did not receive equal opportunities, but even that evolved thought somehow seems to have taken a back seat as someone, as the 5th generation in his family in Sitar, who was already famous before the digital age somehow needs to buy his way digitally to ensure his grandeur 🙊🙊🙊

To put this in perspective, pre-lockdown, haven’t we attended concerts in Shanmukhananda Auditorium (Asia’s biggest?) with some 3K sitting capacity. Why are these events not even 50% sold out? Which means however big you try to show yourself in Sitar digitally, at a given concert 1K-1.5K is the biggest audience you’ll get in a plush auditorium with A/C, with reclining seats and a decent canteen. Add a few more to that number in outdoor events only in select big festivals and also consider that a season-pass holder may not necessarily be your die-hard fan 😂😂😂😂 Now look back at the stats and try and see how much time and resources people have to spend at their disposal, on desperately trying to look ‘big’… How come their is so much disparity in the number of views between both of us, especially since we’ve both uploaded performances over the last 10 years 🤳📸 🙊