I was excited about this concert because it was my first chance to hear a live recital of music for shenai. The shenai is a double reed instrument used in Hindustani classical music. Originally an outdoor instrument used for temple celebrations and weddings, it was brought into classical music in the latter part of the last century, along with other instruments such as the bansuri, a bamboo flute, which had previously been seen as folk instruments.

The shenai is also fascinating because of the influence it had on avant-garde currents in the West in the 1960s – John Coltrane’s adoption of the soprano saxophone was undoubtedly due to Steve Lacy demonstrating it’s abilities, but was also inspired by the sound of the shenai; La Monte Young used the sopranino saxophone in his Theatre Of Eternal Music because of his exposure to Bismillah Khan, the best known shenai virtuoso; Khan also informed Phillip Glass’ choice of voices in his first ensembles.

The evening commenced with a performance of Rag Gaud Malhar, a rainy season raga, on sitar by Viram Jasani. After the alap, he was joined on tabla by Akbar Latif for the second half of this 30 minute performance. Jasani explained afterwards that the last time he had played with Qamar, 22 years ago, they had been accompanied by Latif’s father, Latif Khan. This sense of relaxed familiarity characterised the evening as a whole.

Next Qamar performed Rag Bihag accompanied by Latif and with drone support from an electronic sruti box.  Qamar entranced the audience with his performance. Turner Sims is a grim venue reminiscent of a school gymnasium, and the volume of the shenai gave Qamar the advantage over Jasani in this space. The shenai requires a lot of diaphragm support and Qamar showed this not only in his ability to project and sustain a line, but also in his control over dynamics, and his ability to drop the instrument, if not to a whisper, at least a murmur. He also demonstrated some advanced techniques I had not seen before – trilling by running his finger over the top three holes of his instrument, and producing a Doppler effect by moving from side to side rapidly.

The second half began Latif performing a solo which demonstrated a tala, or rhythmic cycle, in teental, or 16 beats. Despite the fact that he sang the syllables of the theka first, his virtuosity was such that the pattern disappeared as he embellished the cycle.

Two jugalbandi or duets for shenai and sitar followed – although as Jasani generously pointed out, duet is hardly the right word when the tabla is such an integral part of the music. The first was in Rag Manj Khamaj, and the last in Bhairavi traditionally used to close concerts these days. It is a dawn raga and it’s playing undoubtedly singled the end of all night recitals in court. 

I felt that this was the least successful part of the evening. Although Qamar showed his ability to match the volume of the much quieter sitar, much of the music was amiable but tentative.

Qamar and Latif gave a final encore in response to an audience request – the theme from Vijay Bhatt’s 1959 film Goonj Uthi Shenai. It was a fitting end - Qamar had proved the star of the evening and the shenai returned to its popular roots.