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L L L L L D O C U M E N T A R Y L L M U S I C L uch before Bollywood 1965. But for some strange reason, Dev arnatic music is the provoke, and many in the Carnatic became global fashion Anand had decided not to tell her about traditional classical music music universe have risen to the bait. Nasreen Munni Kabir the award so she got the information of south India,’ goes the His unapologetic, often forceful, mode had started to document Living the role only much later. cliché. Like all clichés, it A kind of integrity of argument is likely to alienate some the world of Bombay film The conversations make two expresses one truth while of his readers. Still, everyone stands to professionals through revelations about Waheeda Rehman. concealing another. In L gain if his position is seriously discussed shows like Channel 4’s The first is her extensive knowledge A Southern Music, the with evidence and counterargument Movie Mahal, a 49-part about the technicalities of film craft young Carnatic singer A Southern Music: The Karnatik Story rather than defensiveness. TV series launched in 1986. At a time and their aesthetic implications. The T M Krishna has produced a collection The most intriguing of Krishna’s Mwhen cineastes tended to look at Bombay second is her ability to negotiate her ‘Cof essays that signal a widening By T M Krishna heterodoxies is his attitude to the films with disdain, Movie Mahal was a own terms in a largely male-dominated doubt about the two key adjectives in essential religiosity (or otherwise) of the cultural life-line to many South-Asians industry. When she signed up for her that characterisation: ‘classical’ and HarperCollins Publishers India, 2014, 588 pp., Rs 799 (HB) Carnatic tradition. It is one implication in the diaspora. For over 30 years Kabir first Hindi film CID, the director Raj ‘traditional’. ISBN 978-93-5029-821-3 of his conceiving of it as an “art music” has written books, produced TV shows Khosla (with whom her battles are well- Krishna is no dilettante. His music tradition that the tradition’s relationship and made documentaries on the Bombay known) insisted that she change her is difficult, demanding, and relentlessly with the various forms of Hindu piety film industry. Her documentaries name as ‘Waheeda Rehman’ was too serious. He has acquired a reputation N A K U L K R I S H N A becomes a strictly contingent matter, include the making of Andrew Lloyd long. She refused. Khosla was incensed for outspokenness against the Carnatic in some cases accidents of history. The Webber’s Bombay Dreams for BBC 1, at her temerity as she was not only an world’s hostility to non-Brahmins, essay in which this case is made (“The Follow that Star on Amitabh Bachchan, absolute newcomer but a legal minor non-Hindus and women and the essays Shrine and the Song”) shows Krishna at Lata: In Her Own Voice (which is now whose contracts had to be signed by in this book contain several incendiary attempt to return to Carnatic music the argument quite inappropriate for an his argumentative best. an important book) and The Inner and her mother! When Khosla argued that remarks on these matters. But his spirit of experiment and challenge that introductory primer. It is possible His point of view, he says, is “not Outer World of Shah Rukh Khan. Her “everyone” before her (like Meena heterodoxy can be traced beyond characterised that formative moment in that this uncertainty in register is the atheistic but aesthetic”. In his view, the ‘conversation’ books with Javed Akhtar, Kumari and Nargis) had changed their his political opinions to an aesthetic the late 18th and early 19th centuries. consequence of an editorial failure to aesthetic dimension of Carnatic music is Lata Mangeshkar, AR Rehman and names, Waheeda quietly asserted that philosophy and an interpretation of Krishna brings a 21st century sensibility clarify just whom this book is for. But both chronologically and logically prior Gulzar are excellent resources for both she was not “everyone”. Adding fuel musical history that are these essays’ to bear on a musical tradition at risk a more generous interpretation too to its religious dimension. The aesthetic the devoted cinephile and the regular to fire, she insisted on adding a clause main focus. of resting on its now wilted laurels, is possible: Krishna is trying to take standards of an art musical tradition were film fan. To this excellent repertoire has to her contract: that she would not be It is one of Krishna’s central con- all the while seeking to preserve its apart the whole Carnatic tradition as a in place before that tradition became now been added a book of conversations Conversations with Waheeda Rehman forced to wear clothes that she did not tentions that contemporary Carnatic “integrity”(a word that recurs in these preliminary to putting it back together the vehicle for religious expression. The with actress Waheeda Rehman. By Nasreen Munni Kabir like. During the shooting of Palki, the musical practice stands in an awkward pages). again, having clarified to his satisfaction great Carnatic composers never thought Kabir’s most celebrated body of director K Asif asked his production relationship with its own history. A Southern Music opens with a long, just where its essence is to be found. piety a substitute for musicianship. work is on Guru Dutt which includes Viking/Penguin, New Delhi, 2014, 227 pp., Rs 499 (HB) assistant to call her at 11pm to inform Carnatic music’s origins clearly go a somewhat discursive, section titled An early passage captures many of Composers wrote in praise of patrons a fascinating documentary featuring her about the shooting schedule. The long way back, perhaps in some respects ‘The Experience’, before moving on to Krishna’s central ideas (and some of his just as they did in praise of gods and interviews with his industry colleagues ISBN 978-0-670-08692-4 assistant told him that no one was all the way to the Vedic age. But this the punchier essays on ‘Context’ and penchant for the grand assertion): goddesses, and performers and patrons and contemporaries, many of whom allowed to call her after 9:30 pm. A early history does nothing to explain ‘History’. Krishna is not at his best in Art music is about giving the idea through history have set great store have since passed. It was during the few days later, Asif demanded to know just how Carnatic music came to take by pure musical skill as displayed in making of In Search of Guru Dutt that SHOHINI GHOSH why Rehman had imposed such a rule. the form familiar to its contemporary competitive displays of virtuosity. Kabir met Waheeda Rehman. The usually She replied: “Asif Saab, I am not afraid admirers. There are questions to be These are strong considerations, reserved actress was so animated in her of hard work, but there must be some Here, Krishna goes well beyond the and Krishna’s case is strengthened by career spanning five decades. However, discussion of Guru Dutt that she started dishonour to your profession. The discipline. Only my sisters who live out usual platitudes to offer a narrative of asked here about the implicit his recognising that the question of the it was during the 1950s and 1960s that speaking about him in the present medical profession is a fine one, but if of town or my close friends can call me artistic evolution through the medieval ‘inherent’ religiosity of Carnatic music she acted in some of her best-known distinction between the tense! Writes Kabir: “No story about a doctor misbehaves you cannot blame after 9:30 pm.” and early modern periods. He speculates is beside the point. The real questions films like CID (1956), Pyaasa (1957), Guru Dutt would have been complete his profession, can you?” Rehman died Actresses are rarely asked about intelligently about how the tradition aesthetic and the sacred. are historical – what were the many ways Kagaz ke Phool (1959) Kala Bazar without speaking of her. She is such a of a sudden illness at the age of 52 when the craft of filmmaking as questions might have developed in the hands of The distinction has a certain in which musical practice have been (1960), Chaudvin Ka Chand (1960), vital presence in his work that when you Waheeda was only 13. about their work tend to be limited the now forgotten musicians relying intertwined with the religious life of Sahib Bibi Ghulam (1962), Abhijan resonance in the context of meet Guru Dutt’s fans, you realize that It was to earn money for the to their resourcefulness in front of on the patronage of one of the south south India? And practical – how should (1962), Mujhe Jeene Do (1963), Guide half are in love with him while the other family that Waheeda took to dancing the camera. What is noteworthy Indian monarchies that flourished even (say) the Enlightenment in a contemporary performer respond to (1965), Teesri Kasam (1966), Ram Aur half are in love with her.” Of course, professionally. In 1953 she got an about Rehman’s narrative is that she as the over-studied Mughal Empire was the religious aspects of Carnatic music? Shyam (1967), Aadmi (1968), Baazi Europe, with its attempt to the question uppermost in the mind offer to dance in a film titled Rojulu frames the discussion of film acting on the wane. The chief consideration, to Krishna’s (1968) and Khamoshi (1969).