Art meets architecture in a rare jugalbandi at the Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre

The Grand Theatre at NMACC, Mumbai,
| Photo Credit: Courtesy: NMACC

‘Music is liquid architecture; architecture is frozen music,’ said 18th-century German writer Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe. The two streams might seem unrelated but ‘harmony’ and ‘proportion’ bind them.

A performance can leave you exhilarated, but when the concert hall, with its brilliant design and acoustics, also vies for attention, it results in a jugalbandi all too rare. 

Something similar happened at the Studio Theatre in the recently-unveiled Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre, in Bandra Kurla Complex, an upscale commercial hub in Mumbai. The colossal structure stuns with its geometrical simplicity and ineffable grandeur, but also its pitch-perfect acoustics.

On a warm, humid evening, art and architecture came together when the young, santoor exponent Rahul Sharma, son of the legendary Shivkumar Sharma, stepped on the elevated platform-like stage for ‘SantoorRain’. Accompanying him were Pt Bhawani Shankar on the pakhawaj, Aditya Kalyanpurkar on the tabla and Avinash Chadrachud on the keyboard. The audience soaked in the shower of melodies. 

Vintage raag

Rahul’s hands — gently and sometimes swiftly — traversed across the 100 strings of the santoor, as he played two compositions in raag Megh, the first one in Matta taal and the second in Teen taal. A vintage Hindustani raag, Megh never fails to arouse in the listeners the romance for music and Nature. Here, it brimmed with exciting improvisatory segments.

Rahul Sharma performing the santoor with Pt. Bhawani Shankar on the pakhawaj, Aditya Kalyanpurkar on the tabla and Avinash Chadrachud on the keyboard.
| Photo Credit:
Courtesy: NMACC

Rahul also played compositions created by him, where the classical notes joyfully shared space with contemporary tunes, creating images of cascading waterfalls, calmly flowing rivulets, and snowy mountains. The santoor, after all, has its roots in Kashmir. The play of warm lights and colours in the background, made easy by the tension wire grid on the ceiling, enhanced the beauty of the sound.

Like in baithaks or chamber concerts, sitting in the intimate 250-seater Studio Theatre, one experienced a close connect with the artiste and his music. This interaction can be felt more intensely at The Cube, a 125-seater space to stage experimental works or lec-dems for a close-knit group of art lovers. The tech interventions at the two cozy venues and the 2000-seater Grand Theatre heighten the experience of watching performances.

Meanwhile, the final shows of ‘The Sound of Music’, the first Broadway musical to come to India, are on at the Grand Theatre, which features three-level seating (including 18 private boxes).

This weekend, on the occasion of Guru Purnima, the Grand Theatre’s lavish interiors —  a constellation of LED lights and 8,400 Swarovski crystals on the lotus-petal-shaped ceiling — and contemporary acoustics will blend with the richness of Indian classical music. A line-up of artistes, led by veterans Pt. Hariprasad Chaurasia and Ustad Amjad Ali Khan, will perform to celebrate the guru-sishya parampara.  

Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe must be smiling to see his words come alive.