I was talking to my mother today and she enquired about Haransh. I casually said " O Colby vich tablay baja reha hai" ( He is beating the drums in Colby). She burst out laughing. Naturally, she....
assumed, I was implying that he was idling away at Colby, rather than giving a tabla performance. That got me thinking about the lowly status of the tabla.
" Tabla bajaana", why is Tabla - Indian drum not treated with respect? It was often said at our house "Tu/ O tablay hee bajaenga" (you/ he is only capable of beating the drums), implying a poor career choice or idling away one's life. "Tabalchee"- a tabla player also implies beating the drum to somebody else's tune.
And yet, being a Tabalchee is not that simple. My son managed to give a performance at his college only after months of rigorous practice. He has tabla lessons twice a week. It was one of the main reasons he wanted to go to Colby - free music lessons. Of course, it helped that he had learned the basics of tabla playing in Bangalore many years ago and continued the practice at home off and on, among other activities.
Just the other day, he was telling me that his tabla teacher had very few students spread over a couple colleges. "The attrition rate is high" he learned. Many students come in all enthused and wanting to learn how to play the tabla, but seriously who wants to beat the drum with two fingers for months together? Not that exciting! so far Haransh is the only one from Colby.
Oh well! let us watch his performance now. It is my first attempt at embedding a facebook video on blogger. Hopefully it works..Not working so far......
assumed, I was implying that he was idling away at Colby, rather than giving a tabla performance. That got me thinking about the lowly status of the tabla.
" Tabla bajaana", why is Tabla - Indian drum not treated with respect? It was often said at our house "Tu/ O tablay hee bajaenga" (you/ he is only capable of beating the drums), implying a poor career choice or idling away one's life. "Tabalchee"- a tabla player also implies beating the drum to somebody else's tune.
And yet, being a Tabalchee is not that simple. My son managed to give a performance at his college only after months of rigorous practice. He has tabla lessons twice a week. It was one of the main reasons he wanted to go to Colby - free music lessons. Of course, it helped that he had learned the basics of tabla playing in Bangalore many years ago and continued the practice at home off and on, among other activities.
Just the other day, he was telling me that his tabla teacher had very few students spread over a couple colleges. "The attrition rate is high" he learned. Many students come in all enthused and wanting to learn how to play the tabla, but seriously who wants to beat the drum with two fingers for months together? Not that exciting! so far Haransh is the only one from Colby.
Oh well! let us watch his performance now. It is my first attempt at embedding a facebook video on blogger. Hopefully it works..Not working so far......
And Live was even better.
Posted by Italo Colby on Monday, 13 April 2015
2 comments:
Well done H! Today I cannot get this video to play, but I saw it previously somewhere before - perhaps on Facebook? Hauntingly beautiful music. I hope the tech problem is on my end, and that your readers can all hear the performance.
Thanks Again! Glad you pointed it out... let me see if the link has changes :)
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