MANILAL NAG. Raga Lalit Manilal Nag, sitar; Anand Gopal Bandopadhyay,
tabla. RAGA RECORDS RAGA-213 [ADD]; 61:30
Manilal Nag, a colleague of the late Nikhil Banerjee, was represented
on two World Music Library CDs made nearly ten years ago. This
Raga release is a recent (1989) recording made in Calcutta. The
great qualities of his playing heard on the earlier discs, his
understated tone with its songlike approach, are more developed
here. He is rather different than Banerjee in the opening slow
section (Alap); Banerjee caresses each note while Nag moves more
quickly yet yet with the intensity of one whose thoughts are rapid
and far-reaching. His pacing is such that his complex thinking
saturates the structure of the raga's tones and ornaments, while
making it disarmingly simple through his implementation of the
dhrrupad vocal technique: flourishes which imitate the rapid-fire
shake in fast passages. His playing is of great delicacy and introspection.
One hopes for more of him and Banerjee from Raga. Well-chosen
releases such as these make us the beneficiaries of a golden age
of a classical instrumental art, documented at its best in extended
and live performances.
--Allan Evans