Guitar Gurus

"Bring umbrellas, raincoats, picnic rugs etc." True to those words, these were essential at last night's concert.

The Event: Guitar Gurus - An all night performance by five of India's finest guitarists. An hour performance by each artist and then time for them all to jam.

The Venue: Fireflies Ashram (Don't ask me why Ashram, that's just the venue) The amphitheatre set around a huge Banyan tree.
Finding the place was a big adventure, but one we saw the setting, the effect, the acoustics, we knew we were in for a treat :)
Though it rained continuously through the night, we huddled under umbrellas and enjoyed the warmth of the music.

First Act: John Anthony and his band Karnatriix

Guitar - John Anthony

Percussions - "Darbuka' Siva

Sarangi & Vocals - Faiyaz Khan

East meets West
(Sarangi & Electric Guitars)

The music was a blend of classical (Carnatic & Hidustani) and western. The band played one of my favourite songs of Saint Tyagaraja - "Entharo Mahanubhavulu", Pancharatna Kritis (Five gems of Carnatic music).
Click here for the video of this song from an earlier concert.
You should also check out a better audio of this song on the Karnatriix website.

Second Act: Amit Heri and Sanjay Divecha
This act had no percussion, no other accompaniments ~ just plain guitars.
Amit and Sanjay performed a couple of their own compositions - Peace song & Africa. After which they played some Jazz as well.

Amit Heri

Sanjay Divecha

Earlier in the blog I had made a mention of Charminar, this can be found on Amit Heri's site under Music and album -Morning Raga. Such a short piece, but such strong emotions.

Third Act: Derek Julien and his band

This band started playing at 1AM and they pumped up the volume and the rhythm and had everyone swaying to their music.For a sample of what they played last night click here.

Fourth Act: Vikramjit Banerjee aka Tuki
As it was already 2AM, we didn't stay to watch this act.

The event had such variety, with each group showing off their own unique style. It was a perfect blend of talent and melody. Definitely a musical night to remember. And yes, I'm picking up the albums of these guys. :)

though the event was great, there are two things that I was disappointed with:
1) Timing - The show started more than an hour late, we therefore could not watch stay till the end.
2) A group in the audience (obviously high on something) who created a lot of disturbance and did not let others enjoy the music. People are free to do as they please, as long as they don't bother others.