Pandit Ravi Shankar's Legacy - A New Look

There is a tendency to regard Panditji's music as only a reflection of his music guru, Ustad Allauddin Khan's influence. Actually Panditji was a performing musician much before he met his guru. There is a Vinyl LP originally recorded during his visit (as part of a dance troupe led by his eldest brother, the legendary dancer & choreographer Uday Shankar) to the USA in 1937 called "Indian Music Ragas & Dances". In this record Panditji plays Esraj (a Sarangi-like instrument.)

As Ravi Shankar was also a dancer, there is more emphasis on the tala element even in his mature work as a Sitarist, compared to his "gurubhais" in the same gharana Ali Akbar Khan & Nikhil Banerjee. His pioneering efforts to present Carnatic ragas in Hindustani garb also stemmed from the above mentioned record, where ragas Simhendra Madhyamam & Hamsadhwani are presented.

Panditji's pioneering missionary zeal to popularize Hindustani music world wide may also have been inspired by his brother Uday Shankar's similar zeal to universalise Indian dance abroad. So both his brother & guru helped turn him into the global icon he became later.

Positivity of Pangloss & Pollyanna

In Voltaire's satire "Candide", he satirises the Leibnizian philosophy of "All things happen for the best in this best of all possible worlds", using Dr. Pangloss, the tutor of Candide, as the mouthpiece. Even after all possible misfortunes happen to them, Pangloss stubbornly repeats his dictum, but Candide adds pragmatically, "But let us cultivate our garden."

In Eleanor Porter's "Pollyanna", the eponymous character, is a little orphan girl who comes to live with her aunt. Her late pastor father, beset with poverty, found about 800 "Rejoicing texts" in the Bible, & taught his daughter to look for the silver lining of every cloud. Pollyanna goes about teaching this "Glad Game" to all in the town. But when she herself is nearly paralysed after an accident, she nearly loses faith but is saved by a medical breakthrough, restoring her belief in her "Glad Game."

Music Appreciation

Aaron Copland, the American Composer, in his book "What to listen for in music" divides music appreciation into three planes. 

1.⁠ ⁠The Sensuous plane. Here one listens to the sheer pleasure of the sound itself. A kind of brainless but attractive state of mind is engendered by the mere sound of the music.

2.⁠ ⁠The Expressive plane. All music has an expressive power which, unfortunately (in the case of instrumental music) cannot be put into words. For example each of the 48  fugue themes in Bach's "The Well Tempered Clavichord" mirrors a different world of feeling.

3.⁠ ⁠The Musical plane. Here, in addition to the above two, music exists in terms of its own notes & their manipulation. The musically aware listener should hear the melodies, rhythms, harmonies & the tone colours. He should be aware of musical forms & be able to follow the lines of the composer's thought.

If this is the case of Western Classical Music, Carnatic music, being based largely on Kritis, offer a convenient verbal peg to hang one's appreciation, even in the case of instrumental renditions.

Hindustani, especially instrumental music, has attained an universal appeal, because of its pure, abstract form. But here also, ability to recognise the ragas is a prime requisite in appreciating it.

Many "connoisseurs" have never got beyond the first "Sensuous Plane" mentioned above as evinced by nodding their heads & exclaiming "Wah, wah!" Ustad Vilayat Khan, once asked why he didn't announce the name of the raga he would play, scathingly replied "If they can't recognise the raga,  they are not fit to attend my concert!"