Shubhendra Rao & Saskia de Haas: East-West jugalbandi

Sreevalsan Thiyyadi

Shubhendra Rao and Saskia de Haas were seven years old when they were formally initiated into music, which went on to define their life. Only, they lived in different continents those days. Shubhendra was raised in the 1960s’ southern India, and developed a liking for the sitar of upcountry. None less than Pt Ravi Shankar became his guru in the string instrument. Seven years younger to Shubhendra and 7,700 northwest of his Bangalore home, Dutch girl Saskia found her first master in the cello, residing in a town near Amsterdam. Like Shubhendra, Saskia hailed from a family steeped in culture. That apart, if they did meet in their prime, the reason was their passion for Hindustani classical. A mutual respect would eventually give way to love — and marriage.

Saskia was 23 when she first came to India, smitten by South Asian melodies about which she had got a taste from a heritage institution in The Netherlands. The Conservatory of Rotterdam, 80 km down the student’s native Abcoude, engaged Indian musicians. Particularly impressive was visiting flautist Hariprasad Chaurasia, who gave her a stronger idea of a few ragas and talas. Inspired, Saskia flew to Delhi in 1994. At Delhi University, she took basic lessons from Dhrupad exponent Sumati Mutatkar.

The city then had sitarist Ravi Shankar grooming a disciple: Shubhendra. Trained in the resident gurukul system, the youngster had been a globe-trotting soloist for almost a decade. Saskia graduated and went back to Europe. Shubhendra, on his world tours, would occasionally perform at Amsterdam. The two would meet. Relations deepened. They tied the nuptial knot in 1999, which marked Saskia’s permanent stint as a Delhiite. Five years thence, they got a child, Ishaan Leonard Rao, now a pianist.

Creditable confluence

For a family to be blending notes from diverse cultures isn’t all too common. But the Raos manage it well. In spring last year, the trio presented in Delhi a novel raga jamming with Mozart’s unfinished Requiem (1791). Traditional Indian scales garlanded a sonata, least sounding like fusion.

All of this might sound exotic. Not necessarily, if one zooms into the sociocultural history of the peninsula. Shubhendra’s birthplace, for instance, is Mysore. As a Deccan kingdom, its last ruler was Jayachamarajendra Wadiyar, a connoisseur of Carnatic and Western classical. Tyagaraja’s direct-line disciples adorned his court even while Wadiyar became the first president of London’s Philharmonia Concert Society a year after India’s Independence. Around that time, a certain NR Rama Rao of Karnataka took sitar lessons from Ravi Shankar. Such was his reverence for the maestro that Rao named his son Shubhendra after his guru’s son. Shubhendra Shankar (1942-92) was short-lived, but Rao Junior lights up Hindustani music with updates from the legendary Allaudin Khan, who taught Ravi the sitar for six years since 1938.

Ravi Shankar (1920-2012) was an ardent admirer of Carnatic, lending his sitar to rhythmic approaches typical of the southern idiom. Bangalore, where the Raos lived, promoted both classical streams. Ravi Shankar, once on a visit to the city, asked Shubhendra to play. The six-year-old chose Yaman on the saraswati veena of his mother, Nagaratna. A Hindustani raga along frets that otherwise epitomise the soundscape of Carnatic!

Delighted, Panditji suggested little Shubhendra to try his hand on an instrument one can hold vertically. The boy soon began taking sitar lessons under Ravi Shankar. That was 1971, when, beyond faraway Utrecht’s low sandhills, Saskia was born. She grew up listening to her uncles and aunts playing the violin for numbers tracing to end-Renaissance and early-Baroque eras. She, however, fell for the bigger cello. A Masters in ethnomusicology from University of Amsterdam fostered the pursuit, Chaurasia’s tutorship at Rotterdam leading her to India.

Saskia learned the nuances of Hindustani classical from three (late) virtuosos: vocalist Koustuv Roy, violinist DK Datar and sitarist Deepak Choudhury. The third was a disciple of Ravi Shankar. That way Saskia and Shubhendra partly share styles. Even so, the cellist retains the instrument’s western flair while presenting Hindustani. The lower notes she plumbs have a baritone effect that sweetly juxtaposes the relatively shrill plucks on Shubhendra’s sitar. At jugalbandis, the husband punctuates Saskia’s meandering bows in ways complementing each other.

All-embracing minds

Such chemistry requires eclecticism. Shubhendra, on his part, continues to maintain familial ties with Carnatic. On and off, he’d learn from Chennai-based all-rounder TV Gopalakrishnan, now 90. A grasp over the highly-evolved layakari tempo techniques of the south had been a key mantra of Ravi Shankar as well. Contrastingly, Saskia had to unlearn a lot of her western lessons to traverse the labyrinths of Hindustani. Yet, as she often notes, the self-modified cello strives to groom a sub-genre in Indian classical. All credits to Chaurasia. The liberal attitude of the mentor is perhaps one reason why, for instance, Saskia’s Bilaval retains an interesting tonal tie comparable to C Major in Western music.

Ishaan’s toddler days as a fast learner led his parents to take fresh stock of teaching Indian classical. Recalling that music students of yore were trained under their gharana, the couple realised a lack of homely playfulness missing in the contemporary academic circles of Hindustani. From Shubhendra composing lullabies to Saskia authoring as many as eight books on catching kids young and even pioneering a music curriculum for them, the journey together has been increasingly meaningful.

This weekend (November 19), the duo performs at Varanasi as part of the 2022 Mahindra Kabira Festival along the haloed pilgrim ghats. This will be just eight days after an innovative Delhi show, also involving Ishaan.

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