Arun Ramamurthy and Trina Basu’s music didn’t simply permit for brand new visualisations of historical musical methods, however pointed to the potential of music as a complete. The duo carried out just lately on the Bangalore Worldwide Centre.
| Photograph Credit score: Gayatri Sreekesh
The visible story of ‘Nakshatra’ – a live performance carried out at Bangalore Worldwide Centre by violin duo Arun Ramamurthy and Trina Basu, mirrored two musicians seated aspect by aspect on a gently lit stage, the aural narrative spanned a richly detailed, residing canvas of music that may very well be as massive as you wished it to be. The music of Arun and Trina produced a now-you-see-them-now-you-don’t impact on their particular person enjoying kinds and musical backgrounds.
The duo introduced their music from Brooklyn (New York) to Bengaluru whereas on a go to to India with their household. Touring Kolkata and Bengaluru of their first ever Indian live performance sequence as a violin duo, they introduced snippets from their first album, amongst different musical items. Their music didn’t simply permit for model new visualisations of historical musical methods, it pointed to the potential of music as a complete, if music schooling have been to grow to be as institutionalised in India as it’s within the West.
Arun and Trina started their live performance with a composition devoted to Lenapehoking, the place the indigenous folks of the area had lived in sync with Nature, earlier than colonisation.
| Photograph Credit score:
Gayatri Sreekesh
The live performance started with a musical piece devoted to Lenapehoking (Lenape Land) or Prospect Park in New York, the place the indigenous folks of the area had lived in sync with Nature, earlier than colonisation. Prospect Park, Trina stated, had supplied “nice refuge throughout the pandemic, when the one sounds have been of birds and ambulances.” Set to the favored raga Abheri, the composition was rooted in essential ecological and moral considerations that will be a recurring live performance motif.
Their subsequent piece ‘Tempest’ carried the imprint of readability that comes after a storm. Woven of ragas Gowri Manohari and Vachaspati, for me, it raised questions on how music sourced from such disparate areas can sound so unified. ‘Migration,’ in Mohanam raga, was impressed by the journey their households had taken from Bengaluru and erstwhile Calcutta to the U.S.
The subsequent two items probed Nature’s parts and erratic climate patterns . Whereas progressive notes from raga Hemavati conjured up spirals of the Fibonacci sequence, the duo’s harmonic association of ‘Sri Kamalambike’ in Sree raga highlighted how SRMP and MPNS when performed collectively can grow to be a compounded musical deal with. The duo’s reimagining of this Muthuswami Dikshitar composition delivered to thoughts the historical past of the violin as a as soon as purely western instrument, credited with being tailored to Carnatic music by his brother Baluswami Dikshitar. The shared musical vocabulary of Arun and Trina took that adaptation to new heights. The next musical items have been additionally knowledgeable by American folks, Carnatic, Jazz and movie music, amongst different genres. The duo’s model of deep listening and making area for the opposite’s expression opened up myriad shades of music.
Arun Ramamurthy.
| Photograph Credit score:
Gayatri Sreekesh
Having been launched to one another in 2007 by Arun’s Carnatic music instructor, Mysore Manjunath (after Trina had spent a 12 months coaching in India), Arun and Trina performed collectively in an area Carnatic ensemble, Akshara, shortly after. A “shared musical chemistry,” as Trina places it, led to 2 years of “practising collectively, sharing tales, musical concepts and approaches to the instrument,” Arun says. They began “composing and performing collectively as a duo round 2012,” he provides. Their intent, Trina says, is to “make music, unapologetically from the guts and stretch artistic potentialities,” whereas Arun provides that they “hope to make music that addresses actual world points.”
Trina Basu.
| Photograph Credit score:
Gayatri Sreekesh
“Experimenting with parts and strategies that exist within the totally different violin traditions (Indian raga/tala, western chamber music, counterpoint, concord, fiddle/folks) has given us an expansive palette of colors to compose with. That may be a nice win for us!” says Trina. Arun is impressed by the “feeling of letting go and letting the unconscious take over” of their musical collaboration that he sees as an try to “look inward and make music that’s significant” to them and to audiences.
Each skilled musicians with unbiased careers, they use their residence as “an workplace, rehearsal, educating studio and household residing area,” Arun says, every day studying to barter “challenges related to partnership and parenting.” Trina says they cope by making an attempt to “keep targeted, organised and accepting of the tempo” at which their work evolves. But, none of those challenges have been audible of their music that allowed for various sorts of music to intimately converse with out censure or judgment.
Printed – September 11, 2024 03:06 pm IST
