One of the most eagerly awaited shows in Chennai, it promised a night of unbounded music featuring world famous Jazz bassist Victor Wooten, the famous Prasanna on guitars, Dr Karthick on Ghatam and Bangalore Amrit on the Khanjira. Swarnabhoomi academy of music (SAM), the organizers, couldn’t have chosen a better venue than the luxurious Mutha Venkatasubba Rao Auditorium.
The show started with a video and presentation on the recently concluded weeklong music workshop by SAM, but it was only when the ensemble walked on stage that the audience came to life. Prasanna took the lead (in more ways than one) by “saying a few words in G major” through some carnatic infused playing which quickly changed style to jazz. Wooten soon stepped in with a bass solo featuring tricks from his massive bag like taps, harmonics, and other devices to thrill the audience. Prasanna then announced that the song was called “Garuda” which would be a part of his soon to be released album. At this point I realised that the show would primarily feature Prasanna’s songs with Wooten’s bass as an accompaniment, not the other way around, as I had initially hoped. But it had to be this way, as Wooten’s songs were not written with Indian instruments in mind.
The next song started with a chugging, bluesy riff by Prasanna accompanied by some superb percussion, while Wooten was content with staying in the background. It has to be said that an important part of the bassist’s repertoire is to be able to back a guitarist in a song, and Wooten did that with style, often matching the guitars note for note. Prasanna, meanwhile, turned up the distortion and continued to solo on with added effects, often with both his feet on distortion pedals! I must mention, however, that his stage act was quite rigid (despite his best efforts), unlike the cool flamboyance of Wooten. His guitar playing, however has come a long way from his purely carnatic-inspired initial days, and now features elements of Jazz and Blues, while maintaining a Carnatic core. This is evident from the songs in his album ‘Be the Change (BTC)’, which was being sold outside the venue. Wooten soon took over, with another slap bass solo, and this soon grew into a full scale Jugalbandi between him and the percussionists. It was an eye (and ear) opener to see the bass guitar being used as a percussive instrument!
The next song was ‘Ragabop’ from BTC, which started off with a fast guitar and bass jam between Prasanna and Wooten. Initially carnatic in nature, these bits alternated with breakdowns of a dissonant, jazzy character, the kind of musical terrain where Wooten tends to reign supreme. On the whole, this song was essentially a jugalbandi between the two frontmen. What followed was ‘Ta Ka Ka Ki Ta Blues’, also from BTC. This was a guitar driven song, bluesy in character, with some Indian bits thrown into the solos. Wooten and the percussionists gave support to Prasanna who was clearly the ‘lead’ musician now. I could sense that the crown wanted to see more of Wooten taking centerstage, but that was not to be, at least immediately. Prasanna promised the audience that we would get to see more of the percussionists and Wooten take up the stage after a short break.
What immediately followed the break was a demonstration of Wooten’s genius, where he showed us the various ways in which he could stretch the bass guitar to produce sounds normally not heard from it. The segment he played incorporated bass harmonics, pinches, slap, fingerpicking, strumming and a great deal of stage prescence! Wooten fans from the audience, meanwhile, kept shouting for him to play ‘Amazing grace’ and were soon rewarded. His own rendition of this classic featured both the ‘lead’ (played using harmonics) and the bass rhythm simultaneously, something I haven’t seen done before. Spellbinding!
Prasanna and the others then walked on stage, and quickly broke into a jam. Prasanna led the music, again, soloing on the wah-wah pedal, while the others gave good support. This song, we learned later was ‘Kalyani Connection’ from BTC. Another guitar driven jam followed, but some technical glitches prevented the guitar sound from being heard for a short while. The other musicians stepped to keep the flow going. Prasanna then entered into a Jugalbandi with the percussionists, but it may have lacked some of the freshness and flair of Wooten’s earlier jugalbandi with them. Prasanna then shouted out the words from Marley’s ‘Get Up, Stand Up’ to keep the audience interested, and this section was quite entertaining.
Immediately after, the percussionists took over, and played long alternating ‘solos’ between them. The audience loved it. There is something about percussion that appeals to one’s baser musical sense, especially one’s instinctive sense of rhythm and groove, and I couldn’t keep my hands from playing along to the beats of the Ghatam and the Khanjira. Wooten displayed a child-like curiosity during the proceedings, and was clearly in awe of these Indian instruments and their exponents.
One could sense that the ‘end’ was nearing, and when Prasanna and Wooten took their places for one last jam, the audience were expecting something special. What instead followed was another guitar driven, part-carnatic, part-western jam, where we perhaps saw less of Wooten (and more of Prasanna!) than we wanted. Nevertheless, the song, called ‘Potbelly Blues’ from Prasanna’s ‘Electric Ganeshaland’ was entertaining. What was missing, much to the audience’s chagrin, was another Wooten bass solo!
After that last jam, the audience started getting up to leave, when Prasanna came back on stage and started lecturing on how people in India are afraid to take up music seriously, even as a hobby, that Bollywood has monopolized our musical expression, and that SAM was now offering us a chance to follow our passion under the guidance of musicians like Wooten and himself. All of this was, of course, true, but I do not think that many of us were in the mood for a lecture (especially one that seemed suspiciously promotional), with the consequence that his words were largely unheeded, and the show ended on a slightly bitter, anticlimactic note.
All said and done, it was a show that will be remembered for a long time by the attendees, for the sheer genius of the musicians, who were not afraid to improvise on the spot, experiment between various genres of music and push the envelope even further for fusion artistes around the world.
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