Legend has it that when Malian musician Mamadou Diabate first heard Mukhtiyar Ali sing, he shouted out that Ali’s voice should belong to him! Without a blink, the Sufi singer from Rajasthan said that it is not voices but souls that they should exchange. And souls are indeed the essence of the tunes that flow at Ruhaniyat – a countrywide Sufi and mystical music festival that will touch down at Bengaluru tonight at the Jayamahal Palace Hotel, with performances by Parvathy Baul, Mamadou Diabate, Mukhtiyar Ali, the Niyazi Nizami brothers and Vesabhai Bhopa.
Co-founder of The Banyan Tree, Nandini Mahesh has had a fruitful 15 years organising Ruhaniyat in the several cities it touches every time. She says, “We have had to play interpreters to musicians from all over the world and it is always a joy to watch them overcome barriers of having come from a foreign culture to connect over similarities offered by music itself.”
With a popularity that spans the whole world, Parvathy Baul is a songster who stands as a paragon of the paradox which necessarily defines being a nomadic baul in these times. “I always enjoy coming to Bengaluru because I have a huge number of friends here. The audience is cultivated and it is always a great experience to perform in front of them. Even though I sing in my mother tongue Bengali, there is a spiritual connection with the audience here and the music transcends the barrier of language to make sure that its essence flows. For a ‘baul’ singer, it is not just important to learn to sing, but to enter into the physical and mental universe of a baul,” says Parvathy who will devote her next year in trying to bring her guru Sanatan Das Baul’s legacy to greater prominence.
A performer from Bikaner, Mukhtiyar Ali stands as a lone guard at the gates of the fast-disappearing mystical sufiyana kalam of rural Rajasthan. It is perhaps just as well that he only speaks in chaste Hindi. “Every year, I get to meet with artistes from all over the country, and all over the world. It is one thing to perform for an audience and quite another to perform for another artiste. I have been performing in Bengaluru for a long, long time and always love it. I have also tried to make a foray into the film industry here, but with little success,” he laughs.
In India for the first time from Mali, Mamadou Diabate will bring his west African instrument — the kora — to the city stage with signature aplomb. The Grammy winning instrumentalist says, “My instrument is new to the country and there is so much curiosity and wonder surrounding it that I feel very happy. People have been coming up to me and asking me to teach it to them!”
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