Maximum melody

The entrance to Kitab Mahal was musty with age and construction dust. I made my way up a creaky wooden staircase girded by an ancient banister and a wall full of exposed wiring. However, the fourth-floor gallery that was Studio X was an entirely different space — modern, well-lit and resonating with the sound of music. It is the perfect juxtaposition of spaces for a show titled ‘Making Music, Making Space’. It was just after closing hours and yet I was allowed to look around. A large sprawling flex on the wall announced the idea behind this aural and visual installation — an amalgam of urban topography with cultural practice and history. And underlying it all was a love for Hindustani classical music and its enduring relationships with neighbourhoods and communities. A quote sprawled across the flex — ‘ Yeh nagari mein lakh darwaaza ’ (there are a lakh doors in this city) is evocative for a newcomer to Mumbai like me.

‘Making Music, Making Space’ — an intersection of music, urban history, film, photography and interviews — was curated by cultural theorist Tejaswini Niranjana along with filmmaker Surabhi Sharma, architectural theorist Kaiwan Mehta, architect Sonal Sundararajan and designer Farzan Dalal. The project, which was three years in the making, enjoyed support from the Mumbai Metropolitan Region-Heritage Conservation Society (MMR-HCS), Tata Institute of Social Sciences and India Foundation for the Arts (IFA). An interview with the legendary Gangubai Hangal led to the birth of this venture. Niranjana attributes it to one particular statement: “Gangubai said that a performance in Bombay would earn them ₹125, five times more than what a concert in Hubli would get them. That got me thinking about the importance of the city in the development of Hindustani classical music at the turn of the century.”

The history pieced together was an interpretive pastiche. Hindustani classical music began to establish its stronghold in Mumbai and, more specifically, Girgaum as it was the centre of native trade in the mid-19th century. This was also the period when kingdoms and principalities crumbled, and musicians lost both their benefactors and performance spaces. Mumbai transformed into a place with a host of opportunities amid its new economy and thriving theatre scene, and attracted migrants with varied skills. “New listening experiences were enabled in a proliferation of new public spaces — Parsi theatre, Marathi sangeet natak , the music club, the music school, the baithak in a wealthy patron’s home, the music ‘conference’, and the concert stage in places like Laxmi Baug, Brahman Sabha or Jinnah Hall,” said Niranjana.

The exhibition unfolded through different media — rare photographs, postcards, concert posters and handbills, 3D maps as well as unheard-of recordings and architectural details of theatres and concert halls. While many of these structures are in ruins, some have been torn down or repurposed.

Music thrived within their walls with stalwarts like Sawai Gandharva, Ustad Ali Akbar Khan, Ustad Alla Rakha, Pandit Ravi Shankar, Ustad Bade Ghulam Ali Khan, Gangubai Hangal and Bhaskarbua Bakhale on stage. A series of interviews chronicled the memories of forgotten names like Dhondutai Kulkarni of the Jaipur-Atrauli gharana , who trained under Kesarbai Kerkar.

Neighbourhood strains

A large map of Girgaum spanned the entire length of a wall and acted as visual metaphor of the centrality of this neighbourhood in the musical evolution. Specific roads and bylanes on the map had little pop-up cards with pictures of buildings where the musicians lived, schools where they would teach, small instrument shops where they would congregate, the theatres and local clubs where they would perform, as well as private homes and public spaces that witnessed some of the best baithaks of its time. The music in Girgaum was a mix of styles, indigenous gharanas and traditions unusual in its aspect as it occupied a very native space in an overwhelmingly colonial metropolis. Across the room, a video projection by Surabhi Sharma took us inside several Girgaum buildings.

Play by the ear

The exhibition chronicled a history which was as much about the practitioners as it was about the listeners. From the chaiwallahs and instrument makers to doctors, lawyers and housewives, the audience played an active part in the process. Rather than being the preserve of the privileged few, as in the courtly tradition, Hindustani classical music became a mohalla activity. The large number of musicians who performed at the Ganeshotsav to packed audiences bore testament to this popularity. The presence of women in the field — as artistes, patrons, teachers and students — was also illustrated with the help of photographs, recordings and interviews.

One of the best things to come out of this exhibition was a very real interaction with music and spaces. After a gap of nearly 30 years, live concerts were held in Laxmi Baug, one of the fulcrums of the Girgaum musicophilia.

Diya Kohliis a Mumbai-based freelance writer

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