“How does the raga behave? We don’t treat it as a fixed structure of notes. It has a soul. It comes to power, you watch it flourish. So then, we start developing. There’s a rhythmic section, but still with no percussion. We develop it, and then play with the tabla a cycle of maybe sixteen beats, ten beats, seven beats, it depends. Like jazz, there are so many rhythmic cycles.” – Abhik Mukherjee
Abhik Mukherjee is a Kolkata-born sitar player of the Etawah-Imdadkhani gharana. He was initiated to sitar at the age of six by his father, Sri Tarit Mukherjee, and Sri Bimal Chatterjee, while simultaneously receiving vocal instruction from Sri Kaylan Bose. He has since taken talim from Pandit Arvind Parikh and Pandit Kashinath Mukherjee, themselves disciples of the legendary Ustad Vilayat Khan. He is a gold medalist in musicology from Rabindra Bharati University, Kolkata, and has also received a scholarship from the Ministry of Culture, India.
Sameer Gupta in American jazz and Indian classical tabla player and has created a unique musical sound by combining traditional and modern improvisational styles drawing from his dual Indian and American heritage. Gupta did not begin mastering the tabla until well into his jazz career in the early ‘00s, and now from bebop to avant-garde jazz, and European classical percussion to North Indian classical tabla, he continues to compose and perform music from a true multi-cultural perspective that bridges several continents.
