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On October 5th, 2003 I went to Roy Thompson Hall in Toronto to see Remember Shakti, featuring John McLaughlin and Zakir Hussain. It was my second time seeing Remember Shakti, and both shows were in the same room so the two blend together in my memory like a big five-hour concert marathon with a three-year long setbreak (“We’ll be back in just twenty minutes…”).
As a big fan of John McLaughlin and a lover of Indian classical music this sort of thing was right up my alley. Zakir Hussain is the living master of the tablas and every finger tap and palm swoop was a blissful joy to behold. The man sits cross-legged on the floor seeming not to move at all, meanwhile his fingertips completely fill the cavernous concerthall with thunderous percussion.
And all the while McLaughlin sits beside him, spilling spider webs of scales out of his big hollow-body electric guitar.
The two sidemen were truly unbelievable; where does John McLaughlin find these guys? V. Selvaganesh stole the show with a tambourine solo, but I just could not take my eyes off of U. Srinivas and his electric five-string mandolin. This young man had music in his very heart and soul; the sounds he could make were truly out of this world.
One of his big tricks was running up the neck with super-fast and accurate slurs sliding in and out of his target note, basically pulling sitar-like stuff out of his little tiny instrument. I could listen to this kid do that all day, but he had plenty of other tricks in the bag too. It was like he was just opening up his chakras and singing ethereal music with a five-stringed voice. John McLaughlin related a very telling story when introducing him.
“When I was in India many years ago I saw U. Srinivas playing as a child prodigy and I said to my manager ’Someday, if I practise very hard, I will play music with this person.’”
I did a google search and discovered that Srinivas died in 2014 at age 45 of liver failure, a vegetarian who never drank or smoked. According to his wiki page he was considered the Mozart of Indian classical music and an LP he recorded as a child was George Harrison’s favourite Indian album.
According to me the world certainly lost an amazing talent and I can’t imagine someone like him coming along again for a very, very long time.
So, I guess thank you John McLaughlin for introducing me to such an astonishing talent, and affording me the opportunity to witness his fleeting greatness (twice).
Todd Man Out 