ডাকবাংলা

Green Screen to Diwan-I-Khas

In today’s world, many of us would be familiar with the powerful aesthetic impact that a combination of music and the moving image can deliver potentially. But in reality, the coming together of these two elements has also been fraught with several hiccups and poor handling, particularly so in the case of Hindustani classical music.

Decades ago, I recall receiving what was at the time an extremely exciting phone  call from Dr. Raghava R. Menon, well-known music critic and author on Indian classical music. He asked if I would like to be part of a television project, where classical musicians would record four-minute renditions of raagdari music for a morning show that was supposedly the first of its kind. I agreed readily, although I had no idea of what it takes to be involved in the shooting of a music rendition, albeit one that would last a mere four minutes. For me the bigger challenge was to condense the rendition intelligently for the short format that had been decided upon. Excited and nervous, I reached the location on schedule, and was delighted to find the sprawling lawns around the studio strewn with a whole crowd of musicians, young, old, vocalists, instrumentalists, accompanying artistes, faithful and obedient disciples lurking silently behind the maestros, and several hangers-on too. The lawns of the studio in the heart of Delhi had a definite picnic-like atmosphere, with the artistes joking, sharing anecdotes and laughs with each other, and with steaming cups of tea and refreshments doing the rounds at regular intervals. No one seemed to have a care in the world for the task at hand, namely, to shoot four-minute music videos for classical music.

Occasionally, one or the other set of musicians would be called into the studio when it was their turn to shoot, but as they disappeared into the maws of the building, the others happily resumed their socialising. Unable to curb my curiosity about the goings-on in the studio, I decided to educate myself and slipped into the control room where the director of the project and other crew members were busy working. On the many monitors in the room, I saw a sitar player with an accompanying tabla artiste seated on a stage surrounded by drapes in an overwhelming green colour. Even the stage was draped in green but to my utter consternation, on another monitor placed nearby, the very same set of artistes could be seen seated magically, if rather uncomfortably, on the ramparts of the iconic Lal Qila or Red Fort in Delhi. I think my expression of utter consternation, and indeed, sympathy for the artistes perilously balancing on the pointed tips of the arches of the rampart must have prompted the director to hurriedly explain that he was using a green screen to change the backdrop for each artiste. Opening a large coffee table book with superb photographs from every state in India, he proceeded to place on offer the edge of a cliff on a seashore for my performance. I declined politely and concerned for my comfort and safety, opted instead for the magnificent Diwan -e -Khas at the Lal Qila instead. 

In the final edits that’s how we all appeared – in one or the other unlikely location for part of the video, and with unrelated scenes from rural India inserted into the videos at the editor’s discretion. I recall having my Jaunpuri at Diwan-e-Khas being interspersed with footage from a village somewhere, with cows and buffalos trotting on languidly to my alaap as they chew the cud, and someone seated on their haunches rolling out rotis and cooking them on a smoking chulha. Another less fortunate artiste in another similar venture several years later had a crow flap incessantly over his head as he sang a gorgeous alaap in Lalit. Little wonder then, that attempts to create videos for classical music have not met with too much success. 

Without meaning to sound disrespectful or dismissive of these early efforts to create videos for classical music, such mismatches must be abandoned at all costs if classical music is to be made visually appealing for today’s world where the ‘seeing’ of music has perhaps become even more important than the hearing of music. What then could be some of the ways in which a keen audience could be created for videos or films featuring performances of classical music ? Clearly, the time is ripe for such a discussion and strategising. 

I have no expertise in this area and am therefore not qualified to give any suggestions in this regard, except to say that it may be advisable to learn from past experiences and try and avoid the pitfalls that other genres of music have encountered with the addition of the moving image to an audio track. Remember the music videos of the fairly recent past and even the present where, in India, the music video was used as a marketing tool for popularising music ? The best of albums and artistes sank without a trace if no music video accompanied their work. On the other hand, the music video played incessantly on music channels on television, so often and without any subscription, that no one needed to buy the album to enjoy it. The very tool that was being put to use for marketing ended up ensuring that no one needed to buy the album. You could hear the track on which a music video was produced through the day and on every possible television channel. Ultimately, the money and budgets that were deployed for the music videos ironically far exceeded the budgets deployed for the audio recording. But much like all the king’s horses and all the king’s men being unable to put Humpty together again, all the music videos blaring away on all channels couldn’t  help the sales figures. Unable to see sense, music companies squeezed their budgets for the artistes and for audio recordings mercilessly, choosing instead to spend extravagant amounts on the music videos. 

Over the years, music videos for the popular music genre tended to look repetitive and cliched and while switching channels, it was difficult to differentiate one music video from the other, so similar was the colour, the choreography and even the story-line. The need to have the artistes look and act like film stars was also overwhelming, resulting in a host of non-musicians jumping on the popular music bandwagon, some even becoming fairly popular for a short period of time. 

These are some of the mistakes we must avoid if we wish to present classical music in the video or film format. It would be wise to let the music retain priority and not insist on having all the artistes step out of Lamborghinis in air-brushed and blow-dried splendour before they take up their tanpuras, tablas, sitars and sarods. The very idea of including a storyline to accompany the music, usually an integral part of music videos in the popular genre, terrifies me infinitely. Imagine having the common saas nanad narratives being acted out by the artistes for a video ! I have nothing against non-Indian clothes, but it would look equally strange to find musicians dressed in clothes other than kurta-pyjama and sari, even if they are quite comfortable wearing these, only because the attempt is to make them look ‘cool’ and ‘trendy’ in Western clothing.

Finally, the camera must unfold the magic of a performance of classical music as it happens in real life. The addition of the visual element must enhance the experience one gets in a live concert and capture it for posterity, rather than turn it into a caricature. The pandemic and its continuing stranglehold on our lives demands that we think of the audio-visual representation of classical music seriously and with all the creativity inherent amongst us.  

Illustration by Suvamoy Mitra

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