Cajón Alert!

Greetings,
Here are a couple videos I shot of a pair of my guru-bhais (brother students) in my apartment in Pune:
Umesh Warbhuwan on cajón and Bhargav Garde on tabla. Both are longtime students of Taalyogi Pandit Suresh Talwalkar.

Umesh is an astonishing cajón player, oozing technique and tasty tabla stylings....check it: Here's the Jhaptal:



I'll wait while you go change your pants.

So.... they're working with divisions of 9-4-7 (9+4+7=20, cuts across the tala beautifully)

Try reciting throughout the whole video (including the final composition!):
TakitaTakitaDhikita Takadimi TakitaTakadimi

Bonus if you can keep Jhaptal on your hands as well ;) *see bottom of post for tala

GROOVY! and that final chakradar! *fans self*

Bhargav is an amazing tabla player... balance, speed, tone (though the camera is not getting the bayan very well, trust me, it's sweet)

Here's the 2nd vid: Tisrajati Tintal (Tisrajati=triplets, though Umesh moves into Chatusra [4s] at the end)



I should have warned you to wait to change your pants until after this video...sorry. Go ahead, I'll wait.

Bhargav is in a purely accompaniment role here, but it's NOT EASY. Keep tala, and you'll see why... Umesh is driving to the takiTA of the triplet from 2:34-3:24. :O

The rela (starting at 3:35 until 6:24) is phrases of 7 & 5: TakadimiTakita TakaTakita with some tasty tihais.

Nice goppucha yati (reduction) at 5:58...

aaaaand at 6:25 we hop up to chatusra nadai (4 or 8 subdivisions of the beat) for another blistering rela.

I cannot stress it enough: there are 2 reasons these guys play the way they do:
1. Good taalim (training) from Pt. Suresh Talwalkar
2. Insane amounts of practice.

These guys live at the Gurukul (school) with many other tabla and pakhawaj players, take 2 classes a day with Sureshji, practice in between classes--alone and in groups, and are massive nerds (nerds is a term of endearment in my book, fyi)

Phew!

I gotta go do laundry.

ciao for now!

(btw... both Umesh and Bhargav are on Facebook)

Sureshji working with Umesh (yes, he plays djembe too), pakhawaj wizard Omkar Dalvi (who also plays cajon),  Aashay Kulkarni (a smokin' tabla player, here on calabash) and Kulkarni Milind Vasudeo on harmonium.
I have video of the concert they were rehearsing for, editing, & will release soon...go... buy more pants...

*Jhaptal:
Divisions: 2-3-2-3

Theka:
Dhi Na
Dhi Dhi na
Thi na
Dhi Dhi na

Tala:
Clap-pinky
Clap-pinky-ring
Wave-pinky
Clap-pinky-ring

Class at Suresh Talwalkar's Taalyogi Ashram in Pune

6-7-8-7

oof. I've been neglecting this blog. :(

Here's a short video of a tabla demo I did in an Autorickshaw concert.



This is an adaptation of a tisra nadai (3 subdivisions of the beat, aka triplets) version I learned from Pandit Suresh Talwalkar. The phrases of the triplet version are 6-7-8, and I added another 7, and put it into Chatusra nadai (4 subdivisions of the beat).

If you're playing in a 7 beat cycle, you can play phrases of 7 in any subdivision, and it will always fit. Example:
single speed (7 subdivisions): phrase of 7, w one stroke per beat.
double speed (14 subdivisions): 2 phrases of 7, 2 strokes per beat
triple speed (21 subdivisions): 3 phrases of 7, 3 strokes per beat
quadruple speed (28 subdivisions): 4 phrases of 7, 4 strokes per beat

So, looking at the last one: 7-7-7-7, using TakitaTakadimi (subdivided 3,4) as a generic phrase. The beats are on underlined bols, and accents on capitalized bols (Ta):
TakitaTakadimi
TakitaTakadimi
TakitaTakadimi
TakitaTakadimi

Now...lets steal one microbeat from the 1st phrase of 7, and give it to the 3rd phrase of 7, which gives us:
6-7-8-7
6=3,3
7=3,4
8=3,3,2

It still adds up to 28, will still fit in the tala perfectly.

TakitaDhikita
TakitaTakadimi
TakitaTakitaDimi
TakitaTakadimi

I'm quite fond of this tihai, which has a built in delay! ;)

I will be in India this winter, learning, playing a gig or 2, and hopefully recording some new material for my solo album. Stay tuned!