Vocals
It is Janmashtami, she stands at the corner of the courtyard and watches the crowd. No new sari to sport. But the gaze as strong as ever.
Have you heard? They are all coming for today’s ceremony.
An eminent family was to visit.
Now she sings to me whenever I show up at the temple. I used to carry my dictaphone hoping someone would sing or play something and let me record. Like a sound hunter-gatherer. Now it’s grown into an expectation, almost a demand on her. She aligns with such demand.
- Want to sing? I say.
or
- Feel like singing?
And she says, today I have a cold. Okay, do you want Hindi or Bangla? Or Meera?
There is chitchat in between. Somedays, her voice is stretched. Somedays, she seems more tired. Today is ekadashi, she has been fasting. She says, when she first came to Braj some twenty years ago, the rustic words of the mothers of Braj were totally incomprehensible to her. Ekadashi used to be called ‘ekasi’, and such like. Now she knows all their songs. They call her Meera in the temple at Barsana.
She talks of old Bengali films in between. A song from Deya Neya, which has a Radha-Krishna reference. Someone else joins in the conversation pooh-poohing the decline in musical quality and talent with the takeover of technology in the contemporary times. She says, Kanan Devi didn’t even need playback. She would sing for her own roles. And Suchitra Sen - what a figure! Not like you and me, so short!
Some more songs follow.
One of our cats in Calcutta died today. There are goodbye photos on IG. My mother says animals are so innocent, they grow on you in ways that you have no control over.