It's a great time to be a musician in India, say Pandit Bickram Ghosh and Ustad Taufiq Qureshi
Times of India | 12 February 2025
Pandit Bickram Ghosh and Ustad Taufiq Qureshi Pics: Anindya Saha The lawns of the Tollygunge Club came alive on Sunday as Pandit Bickram Ghosh and Ustad Taufiq Qureshi brought their project, RamTa - Masters of Rhythm, to Kolkata. The concert, presented by the Kolkata Centre for Creativity, marked the official album launch of the duo’s exciting new collaboration. Calcutta Times caught up with the rhythm maestros hours before the show. Read on:
What are your views on Kolkata’s rich legacy of percussion?
Taufiq Qureshi: There are amazing vocalists from Maharashtra, while there have always been amazing percussionists from this state. Kolkata is truly the beating heart of India — and the heart beats in time. I keep coming back to Kolkata for two reasons: the great audiences — and mishti doi (laughs)!
Tell us about RamTa…
Bickram Ghosh: The name ‘RamTa’ was given by Taufiq Bhai — it is a play on our names, made up of the “ram” of Bickram and the “ta” of Taufiq. It also means “playfulness”; we are always playful on stage. Taufiq Bhai and I have always shared a fantastic camaraderie. While we had played together live on many occasions, this is the first time we recorded an album. Last year, I suggested that we try and translate our chemistry to an album and that’s how RamTa came about.
TQ: We have a beautiful friendship, we go back decades, we have the same idols in rhythm. We wanted to try and do something different. We will let our audiences decide on that.
(Clockwise) Jaya Seal Ghosh, Aniruddha Roy Chowdhury,Anay Gadgil, John Paul and Abhishek Mallick
What makes a good collaboration?
TQ: The meaning of fusion is to melt and to blend. Bickram Da is always willing to melt everything — his music, his ego, his attitude. He is always thinking out of the box, and it is a joy collaborating with him.
BG: Both of us carry the weight of our lineage on our shoulders. What I admire about Taufiq Bhai is how he has calibrated the knowledge of the tabla that has come from his father, and his genius brother, into another instrument.
The subject of lineage inevitably brings us to Ustad Zakir Hussain…
BG: Ustad ji had created the ceiling. You can move around it, but not beyond it.
TQ: He may have gone from this world, but you will see him in all of us; in all percussionists.
Taufiq bhai is creating his own legacy — he has brought the language of the tabla over to the djembePandit Bickram Ghosh
Pandit Bickram GhoshWhat do you feel about the booming concert economy that India has been witnessing of late?
TQ: India is prospering, a lot of artistes from abroad are getting good money to come and play here. It is a good time to be in India, and be in the music business. For everyone in concert economy, including technical crews. The scenario only started changing from the late 1990s, much of it due to the Zakir Bhai.
BG: A major change has happened after the pandemic. Music of all genres is attracting audiences. Whether it’s a classical, fusion music concert or Coldplay’s gigs, they are all being well attended. It’s good news for music, good news that people are investing in music.
Kolkata is truly the beating heart of India through its rich legacy of percussionists — and the heart beats in timeUstad Taufiq Qureshi
An abiding memory of Ustad Zakir Hussain
BG: In a concert in Indianapolis with Pandit Ravi Shankar, Ustadji’s tablas did not arrive on time. I was there, but mine were in Chicago. Forty-five minutes before the show, he got one of his students to get a pair of tablas from the window display of an Indian restaurant in town — named Ravi. He went on to play that concert with those tablas as if they were his own. I stood speechless as he came down from stage. He saw me, and asked, “Kya, accha nahin laga?” I went back to my hotel room and practised through the night.
TQ: On a Masters of Percussion tour in 2002 with Ustad Sultan Khan, the format was that Sultan Ji would begin the show, and then one by one, we would go on stage — after Zakir Bhai. As I waited in the wings with Selva Ganesh, Zakir Bhai came and asked us, “Are you nervous?” I said of course; going on stage after Ustad Zakir Hussain is harakiri. He smiled and said, “It’s good to be a little nervous — because that will keep you alert and focused.” For the first time in my life, someone told me that a little nervousness, pre-show, was fine — and that it should always be there.