MUMBAI: India’s ace sitar player and inventor of the zitar, Niladri Kumar launched his album ‘Priority’ at one of city’s well known college festival ‘Umang’ under the Saregama label on Monday. Niladri played instrumental solos from his album, besides playing tunes like Raghu Pati Raghav Rajaram and Smoke on the water, which erupted out of pure spontaneity and were well received by the audience. In an hour long set, Niladri enthralled the audience by giving a jaw-dropping performance. Also present at the album launch were Pt. Kartick Kumar ( Niladri Kumar’s father), Pt. Jasraj, Durga Jasraj, Sivamani, Louis Banks and Taufiq Qureshi. This was the first time that an album launch was a part of a college festival. Looking at the response, festivals are certainly a good platform for album launches as it allows the record labels to expose the younger crowd to the artiste.
EVENT REVIEW
I went in with the expectation that I would watch Niladri Kumar play ‘zitar’, but Kumar didn’t play it at all – instead, this virtuoso, virtually transcended the instrument and took audience on a musical ride – He was not just plucking strings of his sitar, but the strings of everybody’s heart, literally.
Related Post
For those who don’t know, ‘zitar’ is electric ‘sitar’ invented by Kumar. The ace sitar player has replaced the original 20 strings of the sitar with just five and still manages to do everything which even an accomplished sitar player would envy. One more addition is the ‘pick up’ which allows Kumar to connect the Zitar to the amplifier and use host of other things like effect pedals which guitarists usually use to create a unique sound. With this, Kumar has developed a signature tone, which, like a spell, stupefies the listener till he stops! It’s rather interesting because many guitar players try to imitate the sitar, either by playing over a particular scale or using a patch which sounds like a ‘sitar’. However, Kumar has successfully managed to create a signature sound which emulates the guitar and at the same time keeps the flavor of sitar alive. So, even if he play’s Deep Purple’s ‘Smoke on the Water’ or solos over a typical rock progression it sounds perfectly in-place.
On stage, Niladri was accompanied by well known talented musicians like Gino Banks on Drums, Anant Sharma on Vocals- Keyboards, Rupan Kulkarni on Flute, Elvis Lobo and Harish Solanki on Guitars and Satyajit Talwalkar on Tabla.
Niladri started the set with an instrumental solo and jammed for good seven minutes, and after it was over, amidst the continuing applauses, Niladri cheekily said, “Well, this song was called ‘The Sound Check'” leaving the crowd in a frenzy. The flawlessness, effortlessness and spontaneity of his playing continued till the very end of the concert. Niladri lifted the ‘zitar’ in his trade mark style every time he hit a high note after his intense and explosive renditions. The ace musician also sprinkled his solos with some (clear) artificial harmonics, which is very challenging for any sitar player. One of the highlights of the event was the ‘jugalbandi’ between Niladri, Elvis and Harish which lasted for quite some time. This was followed by solo performances of fellow musicians. The event reached a crescendo towards the end when Niladri, with his distorted ‘sitar’, kept digging the notes completely lost.
I’d say it was the ‘zitar’ which was playing Niladri!
P.S : You took the ham¦
