Tabla, As a Way of Life

National Library Bibliothèque nationale 1+1 of ,nada du Canada Acquisitions and Acquisitions et Bibliographic Services services bibliographiques 395 Wellington Street 395, rue WeIIington Ottawa ON K1A ON4 Ottawa ON K1A ON4 Canada Canada The author has granted a non- L'auteur a accordé une licence non exclusive licence allowing the exclusive permettant a la National Library of Canada to Bibliothèque nationale du Canada de reproduce, loan, distribute or seil reproduire, prêter, distribuer ou copies of this thesis in microform, vendre des copies de cette thèse sous paper or electronic formats. la fome de microfiche/nlm, de reproduction sur papier ou sur format électronique. The author retains ownership of the L'auteur conserve la propriété du copyright in this thesis. Neither the droit d'auteur qui protège cette thèse. thesis nor substantial extracts fiom it Ni la thèse ni des extraits substantiels may be printed or otherwise de celle-ci ne doivent être imprimés reproduced without the author's ou autrement reproduits sans son permission. autorisation. This dissertation is an ethnography about the men and women who take up the practice and performance of a Hindwtani (North Indian) dmcalled tabla, as a way of life. Learning tabla means that percwionists mut find a guru, a leamed master of the tradition who will guide them in their life long study of this instrument. The relationships formed between gums and disciples are distinctively different in kind fiom teacher-student relations in Western knowledge systems. The guru-disciple tradition is a very specific, culturally dependent mode of leaming originating fiom the Indian Brahmanicd tradition of religious study. Discipleship is a form of apprenticeship which offers no easy translation, philosophically, culturaily or spiritually. My ethnography and analysis of tabla as a way of life is presented fiom my own situated perspective as a tabla disciple of two tabla masters, Ustad Alla Rakha Khan, his son Ustad Zakir Hussain and as a visiting tabla enthusiast with another teacher of tabla, Ritesh Das. 1 offer a multi-local ethnography which centres on tabla communities based in Bombay, India, Toronto, Ontario, Vancouver, British Columbia, Seattle, Washington and the Bay Area of California. As tabla travels around the globe, outside of India, the leaming and teaching of this tradition changes somewhat in its new environments. However, learning to play tabla whether in Indian or diaspora cultures necessitates adopting Indian ways of knowing, learning and being. For those musicians of non-Indian ethnicity who become dedicated to this art form leamhg tabla also means leaming to embody Indian culturai ways of doing and knowing. 1posit that leaming the cultural, as in learning tabla, begins in the body and the embodied mind. Knowing through and with the body requires re-conceptuaiizing anthropological concepts of culture, memory and tradition. Grounding an analytic concept of the body in the emerging critical Anthropology of the Body and the Anthropology of the Senses allows for an examination of the social as something more than cognitive and language based. .. LI1 TABLE OF CONTENTS Abstract Table of Contents List of Figures Acknowledgement INTRODUCTION: THE PASSION OF TABLA Chapter One Sensing Ethnography 1 Touching Feet: On Becorning a Disciple Chapter Two Sensing Ethnography II Tabla Tales Chapter Three Sensing Ethnography III California Dreaming Chapter Four An Apprenticing Anthropologist: Theorizing the Method The Anthropology of Apprenticeship Radical Empiricism Situatedness Apprenticeship: Pretense or Reality? Gurus, Disciples and Tabla Players The Body as Knowledge, Culture as Body Chapter Five Embodying Cultural Memory: Learning to Become the Master Mirroring the Flesh Imitation and Tradition Mimesis and the Habitua1 Body The Habit of Touching Feet Culture, Memory, Embodiment Oral Tradition: Passing on Tabla Knowledge Vision and Sound: Contesting Ways of Knowing Terekete Obsessions: Rhythms and Stones The Master's Message Stones About Feet Chapter Six Tablascapes: A Study of the Intercultural Global and Locd Articulations Sites of Crossing Mediascapes Other Tabla Crossings Changing Models: Gurus and Disciples Gendering the Ties of Tabla Questioning the Master Summary and Conclusions Epilogue Glossary Bibliography Appendix 1 Sample of Tabla Notation Appendix 2 Members of the Punjab and Lucknow Gharanas Appendix 3 Parts of the Tabla Appendix 4 Map of India v List of Figures Figure 1 Parts of the Tabla Figure 2 Map of India Acknowledgement 1 would like to thank The Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute, The University of British Columbia Graduate FeIlowships Cornmittee and The Basant SUigh and Hamm Kaur Singh Foundation for their generous financial support. To my partner in life, Tirn Paterson, 1 am deeply grateful for your guidance and love. To my mother Thelma Nuttail and my mother-in-law Nora Paterson, thankyou for being there emotionally, fmacially and otherwise. A special thank you to Peggy and Harry Andrew for their hospitali ty . 1 am deeply indebted to my anthropological masters, Dr. Marjorie Halpin, Dr. Martin Silveman, Dr. Stephen Inglis and Dr. Carole Farber, who have given me the opportunity to explore an idea and who have in the process become very special fnends. 1 would like to thank Dr. Mandakranta Bose, a colleague who shares my passion for Indian classical dance and music. 1would like to thank Dr. Patricia Kachuk, Dr. Linda Mattson, and Dr. Millie Creighton for al1 their encouragement and support. 1 am also deeply indebted to my tabla masters, Ustad Alla Rakha Khan, and Ustad Zakir Hussain for opening up their lives to me and without whom this dissertation would not have been possible. 1 thank you for taking me on as a tabla student and for opening up this new direction in my life. Much thanks to Ritesh Das, Pandit Swapan Chaudhuri, Joanna Das and Eric Parker for their time, love and ftiendship. 1 am very appreciative of the tabla players, tabla fiiends and other musicians who helped me to understand the world of Hindustani music; Ustad Sultan Khan, Rarnesh Mishra, Fazal Qureshi, Satwant Singh, Yogesh Sarnsi, Selva Ganesh, Vikku Vinayakra., Bhavani Shankar, Pandit Dinkar Kailcini, Giani Mani Singh, Leen Minton, Tyler James, Uday Agnihotri, Kulbushan Bharagava, Peter Altenburg, Dana Pandey, Stefan Cihelka, Dorothee Krauss, Tim Witter, Jim Owen, Swami Das, Ashok, Rakesh Parihast, Suphala Patankar, Emam, Tor Dietrickson, Michael Lewis, Joe Cohen, Kaye Lubach, Steve Vierck, Ojas Joshi, Kathleen Llyod, Rekha Sharma, Jaswinder Daheri, Rahul Das, Ed Haniey, Santosh Naidu, Amar Seepersad and Jai. Special thanks to the Ali Akbar Khan College of Music, The Pandit Jasraj Foundation, Asha Lohia and Paul Doucette. 1 INTRODUCTION: THE PASSION OF TABLA The stories that follow in chapters one, two and three are select vignettes or segments of a journey that 1 have activeiy been engaged in for the past three years. In October of 1994 1 became a student of a North Indian (Hindustani)' percussion instrument known as tabla. Leaming to play tabla or any Hindutani instrument necessitates finding a ieacher, a guru, a learned master of the tradition who will guide you in your studies and life long leaming of such an instrument.' And so 1 became a disciple, an apprentice of tabla. In the begi~ing1 did not realize that becoming a tabla apprentice would profoundly change my life. My tabla joumey began in Vancouver, British Columbia where 1 found a disciple of Ustad Alla Rakha Khan who was eking out a living performing and teaching the Punjab gharana or style of tabla3. My first teacher, Satwant Singh led me through the very painfûl process of learning basic tabla grammar known as bols.4 1 dready had plans to travel to Dehli to 1Regula Qureshi defines Hindustuni music as "the system of classical music common to the northern part of the Indian subcontinent, including regions of North India, Pakistan and more peripherally Bangladesh, as against the Southem or Karnatak system of classical music" (Qureshi 199 1: 1 64). *The words tabla and guru will not be italicized in the text. 3 Within the Hindustani classical music system six major schools or styles (gharanas) of tabla have emerged. The Lucknow, Ajrara, Delhi, Farukhabad, Benares and Punjab gharanas have remained separate and distinct, but the teaching of some styles has moved from the traditional guru-disciple (shishya) relationship to the more modem musical colleges such as Gandharava Mahavidyalaya. Alla Rakha is a disciple of Mian Kadur Bux, guru of the Punjab ghmna. Today as head of the Punjab gharana Alla Rakha continues to teach within the guru- disciple (ustad-shagird) structure. 4See glossary for an explanation of bols. 2 observe the teaching and learning of tabla at a musical college but SatwantjiS suggested that 1 also travel Mersouth to Bombay and study with his teacher, Ustad Alla Rakha Khan, whom he affectionately referred to as Abbaji, a Musiim name for father. After four months in Delhi and Bombay 1 retumed to Canada and studied with another tabla teacher, Ritesh Das, in Toronto. Riteshji has the largest number of tabla students of any institute in Canada. He teaches in the Lucknow style of tabla playing, under the guidance of Pandit Swapan Cha~dhuri.~The next part of my journey took me to Seattle, Washington where 1 began classes with Ustad Alla Rakha's son Ustad Zakir Hussain. Zakiji also teaches in the Bay area in California. 1 have travelled with Zakirji and some of his students up and down the West Coast, in the Bay Area and in Seattle, and have in the process become one of his students. My interest in tabla as an instrument and in Hindustani music stems first and foremost fiom my love of Indian performance forms. My desire to learn tabla developed after writing (199 1) about a South Indian classical dance form, Bharata hiatyam. Because 1 could not dance myself 1 found that my descriptions and analysis of this dance form were lacking.

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