Bela Fleck, Zakir Hussain and Edgar Meyer

First of all, what a combination I must say!

It was a tough day, full day of work and then a two hour drive to Davis, CA to see this magical trio performing some of the loveliest compositions. Luckily we have a friend who now lives in Davis and recommended a pre-concert dinner place, that too one of my favorite cuisines :). Cafe Italia is one of those family owned, small town, almost 50 year old place,serving mainly Italian food. I ordered my favorite Baked Eggplant Parmesan and a Minestrone soup. It was nice, combined with a glass of Cabernet Sauvignon, it was almost a perfect meal for me.

Anyways, coming back to point, once we reached the concert hall, it was clear we were in for a treat. They played the likes of Babar and Out Of The Blue from The Melody Of Rhythm. Note that the title should have been Bahar instead of Babar apparently!

There were some magical moments and some dull as well, but they were short lived. We came back home at 1am, but it was totally worth it. Next time we will be looking forward for more of this trio in Bay Area.

Euphoria Live in Concert

With hits like "Dhoom Pichak Dhoom" and Mairi they don't need any introduction. The concert was packed and super energetic. Palash is a true rock star and he made sure everybody was jumping and dancing with him (yes, for all the three hours he was jumping and dancing!!!)

I must admit that although I didn't hear a lot of songs from them (only the ones that got really popular), but the way Palash sang the songs and kept the audience with him, it was really amazing. He also managed to squeeze in some Bollywood hits like "Dil Se", "Masti Ki Pathshala" and "Pichle Saat Dinon Mein" among others.

Overall it was a great show and I enjoyed a lot.

Zakir Hussain's Masters of Percussion - Pure Bliss

It was a long and tiring day at work but I was motivated. It was time to experience the magic again. After full day of work, and almost one and half hours of driving, I was in for a treat. Zakir was performing at Herbst Theater in San Francsico downtown.

http://www.sfjazz.org/concerts/2010/spring/artists/hussain.php

Artist Personnel:

Zakir Hussain: Tabla
Ganesh: Violin
Kumaresh: Violin
Sabir Khan: Sarangi (he could not make it due to Visa issues unfortunately)
Sridar Parthasarathy: Mridangam
Navin Sharma: Dholak
Taufiq Qureshi: Percussion

Featuring the Motilal Dhakis of Bengal
Gokul Chandra Das: Processional drums
Ranjan De: Processional drums
Sankar Das: Processional drums

I have been fortunate enough to attend many concerts by Zakir bhai, and he always brings so much new and different to each of his shows. This show was no different. Taufiq started out with an amazing piece by calling "breathing as a form of rhythm", and what a rhythm it was! He used sound of his breath along with a tambourine and creating rhythm, it was amazing.

Zakir bhai came in next and he created magic with his hands on tabla. It was a long and beautiful piece. Taufiq and Zakir played for a bit after the solo performances.

Gokul Chandra Das, Ranjan De and Sankar Das (from Motilal Dhakis of Bengal) came to the stage with big Dhols (similar to the ones you usually see in Indian weddings, processional drums) and they played folk music, it was good. People started thinking there may be one or two more pieces and the show will be over, but show just got started after almost an hour of amazing percussion magic.

Zakir and Taufiq were accompanied by Ganesh and Kumaresh (both on Violin) and Sridar Parthasarathy (on Mridangam). They played Raag Janaranjani and then Raag Kalyani. Zakir and Taufiq were playing along. Violin is one of those instruments that soothes the whole environment, and along with tabla and Mridangam it created such a momentum that audience was in awe of talent on the stage.

The last addition was Navin Sharma on Dholak, who also gave a nice solo performance. The show was ended with a long and beautiful jugalbandi and a combination taal.

It is time to sleep and relax now, the sound of Ustad's tabla will be ringing in my ears for sometime now :)

Maestros in Concert Featuring Pandit Shivkumar Sharma & Zakir Hussain

Date: Friday, April 10, 2009
Presenter: University of California-Santa Cruz
Venue: Rio Theatre, Santa Cruz, CA
Start Time: 7:30 PM

What can I say! I have been a great fan of Pandit Sharma as well as Ustad Zakir Hussain and had the privilege of listening to them perform multiple times (the last time was in Buffalo, NY circa 2005). These two people create three dimensional magic in air.

I bought a CD on the venue to make sure I get their autographs this time (yeah earlier I did meet them but never got autograph). The CD I bought was from Moment Records, which I is Zakir's own company.

So anyways, the bouncer was pretty rude to us and told us that the artists do not want to meet anybody and they want to leave right away. He tried discouraging us as much as he can, but boy did I learn from my past experiences or what! I knew persistence wins after all. We waited for them to come out from the side to get in the car (Rio is a very small theater and considering it is in the middle of downtown Santa Cruz, which is very small anyways, this was hardly a guesswork). We could see both of them getting in their individual cars (may be they were staying at different places etc.). The bouncer was still making sure we don't get to meet them (no idea what was his problem?), but I used the sign language from far to Pandit Sharma for autographs. I am not sure whether he felt it was cold outside or he as just really tired, he ignored us. Zakir was in a car behind Pandit Sharma's and he accepted the request. Not only did he smile (bingo!) but he actually got down of the car, gave us autographs and let us take pictures with him. What a gentleman and down to earth person!

Wah Ustad Wah :)

The bouncer was pissed at us but hey we got what we wanted ...

Here are few pictures of the CD: