InDepth

They had quite similar breaks. One started from theater, one started with art-house cinema, the last one started with a family-oriented movie. None of them had a resounding debut. Their first films were not reviewed by multiple film journalists. Their profile pictures were not splashed across various newspapers. There were no social media or online forums during those days. As a matter of coincidence, all three were born in the year 1965. Aamir Khan's debut film " Holi " was released in 1984, Salman Khan's first movie " Biwi Ho To Aisi " was released in 1988 and Shahrukh Khan's debut film " Deewana " was released in 1992. Their respective arrivals into the Indian film industry were thus separated by exactly 4 years. All of them had quite distinguished family background. Aamir Khan is the nephew of the eminent Producer-Director Nasir Hussein. Salman Khan is the eldest son of the legendary script writer Salim Khan and Shahrukh Khan'...

    Let me start with an honest confession that I am not the one who follows league football that happens across the globe. My footballing sense and love come from some amount of Euro, little amount of Copa America and a major amount of the World Cup. Playing for a nation is a matter of pride and this “Beautiful Game” often becomes an ambassador of a certain nation. The two aspects are definitely interconnected.                                                             Football, being a team-game, have produced many teams over the years. These teams have been created, dismantled, re-created and re-destroyed. Who can argue to the fact that all the World Cup winning teams of the last five or six decades have been "teams". We have known of "The Brazilian Team", the "Argentine Team", the "Italian Team", the "French Team" and, of...

There are two versions of a certain story. The story of the song "O Majhi Re" from the film "Khushboo". The first one goes something like this - it was raining all night and R.D.Burman, the legendary composer, was not able to sleep. The raindrops falling on the window panes were producing some very deep, throbbing sounds. They resonated in the ears of the great musician. An idea was born! Pancham liked the sound very much. He was a creative genius. For him, it was just a matter of mixing his own emotion with the emotion of the ambiance. He recorded the sound, enhanced it and used it as a beat together with his ordinary percussion. The other version of the story says that - he used bottles with different levels of water and produced a series of haunting beats. Same effect was produced as described before. Whatever be the original source, it points out two things. Firstly, the creator is skillful and imaginative. Secondly, the creation he has made is unique ...

    The power of Indian classical music is sometimes inexplicable in terms of words.  The different Raaga-s, meant for different times of the day, are a great source of mysticism. The power of those probably lie in their design.     A researcher in the field of music would perhaps be able to find out why and how Raaga Bhairavi originated, but that is the not the topic of this blog post. Building up a musical sense originates from building up a musical ear. Many classical musicians from the sub-continent say: "Half of the musical "gyaan"(knowledge) comes from listening." Therefore, I too start with the listening part.                      Pandit Hariprasad Chaurasia playing Raaga Bhairavi     Bhairavi - in the Hindustaani form - has seven (sometimes also referred to as "eight", including the high note "Sa") notes in the octave, with four of them in the "Komal" form. Herein lies the tonal qual...