"Ustad Ali Akbar Khan: The Jodhpur Years" -- A Hidden Gem of a Book and my rambling account of reading it...

This book came as a complete surprise to me.  Though this book was published in 2008, I got to know about it only in 2013.  I was kind of cajoled into writing a teaching module for the PG course on Comparative Literature to be started by IGNOU.  And then Prof Malati Mathur at IGNOU got in touch with me and I started working on the module and so on and so forth.  After a while I got a mail from Prof Malati Mathur, which was an invitation to attend the launch of her book of poems Affinities…and attached to the mail was a kind of ‘author’s introduction’ and listed among her various publications was the book Ustad Ali Akbar Khan: The Jodhpur Years…and this caught my eye…and then I wrote her a mail congratulating her on the launch of Affinities and told her that I would very much like to read her book on Ustad Ali Akbar Khan… and that I have been listening to his sarod for years now... Prof Malati Mathur then wrote back saying that Ustad Ali Akbar Khan was her father-in-law's guru when he was a court musician at Jodhpur, a period hardly or probably not at all documented and that her father-in-law learnt both sitar and vocal from Ustadji at that time…this response further kindled my curiosity…and by now I wanted to get hold of the book anyhow… Prof Malati Mathur had arranged a meeting of all the unit writers at Delhi, but I couldn’t attend the meeting…Prof. Sriraman, who had initially cajoled me into writing the unit, attended the meeting and I think before leaving Hyderabad, he told me that the publishers (Indialog, New Delhi) of Affinities, who also happened to be the publishers of Ustad Ali Akbar Khan: The Jodhpur Years, would be giving a discount on both books and asked me whether I would be interested… I jumped at the chance and asked him to get me Ustad Ali Akbar Khan: The Jodhpur Years…I could lay my hands on the book finally and finished reading it in two sittings…

A day later I sent Prof Malati Mathur a mail telling her that I thoroughly enjoyed reading the book ...and that she has written Ustadji’s days at Jodhpur so evocatively, bringing alive the entire time and space of that period.  I am a compulsive reader of books about Hindustani classical music, autobiographies of ustads and pandits, books on gharanas, accounts of bygone days of formidable ustads, etc.  I think I do this because I like Hindustani classical music very much, but since I haven’t learnt either to sing or play an instrument, I only listen and in order to immerse myself or to get lost in the world of Hindustani classical music, I read about singers and their songs.

This book, then, is an account of Ustad Ali Akbar Khan’s life in Jodhpur while he was the court musician there.  It is narrated by Sri Ramlal Mathur, who was one of Ustadji’s earliest disciples.  The blurb at the back says that Ramlalji was also an intimate friend of the Ustad and was privy to certain personal and endearing moments in the Ustad’s life during the time.  Prof Malati Mathur says in her preface that Ramlalji had written some of his memories in Hindi and she had jotted down some parts while he spoke, recollecting memories and conversations and she says that it is Ramlalji’s voice throughout. 

The book begins with the Golden Jubilee Celebrations of the Ummed Bhawan Palace, Jodhpur held in 1993 to which Ustadji was invited by Gaj Singh, Maharaja Ummed Singh’s grandson.  Ustadji was the court musician at Jodhpur during the reign of Maharaja Ummed Singh and Maharaja Hanwant Singh.  This was during 1945-51 and Ramlalji was meeting his guru after a long long time, now in 1993.   Ramlalji came to Jodhpur from Jaipur the day after Ustadji arrived in Jodhpur and the Ustadji greeted him with, ‘And where were you yesterday?’  One can immediately see the intimacy that the guru and shishya shared.  The first chapter sets the tone for the rest of the narrative and we go back in time, almost fifty years, back to the 1940s.  For me, this narrative move is a masterstroke…like beginning with ‘colour’ in 1993 and flashbacking into ‘black & white’…this must be Prof Malati Mathur’s doing…great start…then there is some information about Ustadji’s lineage and Jodhpur…and Ustadji arrives in Jodhpur in 1944…

Hanwant Singh was the Maharaja then and Ramlalji notes that Hanwant Singh was one of the fortunate few people who had the opportunity to listen to Ustadji music at small, private sittings or in luxurious solitude and Ustadji would play with single-minded concentration and dedication, as though he were playing to himself, and the resulting music would be exquisite – something not possible in a packed auditorium.  The narrative then focuses on Ramlalji’s first meeting with the Ustad, and later becoming his disciple…there is a wonderful account of the formation of an orchestra at Jodhpur initiated by Ustadji, much like the Maihar band started by his father, Ustad Allaudin Khan…Ramlalji meets with Ustadji’s father, the formidable Ustad Allaudin Khan, a  couple of times and these meetings are described in such a manner that brings out the fondness of the father towards his son, but which he wouldn’t show in public…Ustad Allaudin Khan wants to know about his son and asks Ramlalji discreetly about Ustadji and one can see Ramlalji caught between father and son…

Ramlalji meets a host of great classical musicians in Jodhpur, whom Ustadji invited from time to time…Pandit Ravi Shankar, Pandit Nikhil Banerjee, Ustad Vilayat Khan, Jaidev, the music director…and musical event of theirs at Jodhpur is described in great detail…but, for me the highlights of this book are the descriptions of the Jodhpur Music Conference and the All India Music Conference at Calcutta…those days must have been musically exhilarating, with all those stalwarts staying in one place and playing and singing and meeting each other…there are some unforgettable episodes like Ustad Allaudin Khan playing the violin…a senior tabla maestro asking for an extra coupon at the bar so that he is fortified enough to survive the encounter with Ustad Allaudin Khan and Ustad Ali Akbar Khan, ‘two ferocious lions,’ he called them…Ustad Allaudin Khan flying into a rage against Ustad Ali Akbar Khan… Ustad Allaudin Khan touching the feet of his guru’s disciple, even though he was much younger than Ustad Allaudin Khan…

I told this to Prof Malati Mathur after I read the book…”as I was reading the book, there was an un- describable feeling...almost an imaginary lump in the throat...sometimes I would just close the book and my eyes and a most wistful feeling would envelop me... those days will never come back again...I get this feeling whenever I read Ustad Alladiya Khan’s autobiography, Pt Mallikarjun Mansur's autobiography Ustad Amir Khan’s biography, and Kumar Prasad Mukherjee's The Lost World of Hindustani Classical Music...”

This book is a hidden gem…those of you who like the world of Hindustani Classical Music would no doubt enjoy the book thoroughly…I would have liked the book to have another hundred pages…!!!  Thanks a lot to Prof Malati Mathur for bringing this book out, literally as well as metaphorically, to the outside world…for transcribing, for translating, and for narrating the early professional life of Ustad Ali Akbar Khan so beautifully…