The White Mogul

By Al Gromer Khan

A teenage boy runs away from the national service in Germany. In ’Swinging London’ Indian sitar
music seems to be an interesting option in his quest for self-exploration.
Nineteen-year-old German Hans von der Thann starts out from the chaos of the Flower Power in
London and moves on to India to follow an eccentric music master who has mesmerized him with
his music.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Oct 18, 2013
• ISBN: 9783981270280

Book preview

Prologue

My name is Hans von der Thann. I own an old surbahar. This instrument dates back to the time of Queen Victoria and the maharajas of the British Raj. It is a dark aubergine colour, with a type of intricate carving and ornamentation that is no longer done today. This worn and aged instrument hung in the dusty shop of M.P. Jagannath – Makers of Fine Musical Instruments – for more than thirty years, in a quarter of Bombay where one ventures only when it is absolutely necessary.

The surbahar is a kind of sitar – an Indian lute – with strings of tin-plated steel wire and thick, deep-sounding ones made from bronze alloys. This instrument is capable of transporting one by its sound alone to secret locations – places one knew as a child: the wind in the summer trees, where one could hear the silence. For me, this feeling was then still hidden behind a veil, but the soul was too old for it to remain concealed for long. Today I still believe that I am wasting time when I do something other than play on this instrument; for this I have been called a fanatic by people who have nothing of this kind.

Whether the deep and dark sound, from which all of my work and doings stem, leads me into a frenzy of bliss or a fathomless gloomy isolation, is another question. In the light of the extraordinary and dangerous experiences that are about to be told, the vicissitudes of my life take on another colour – on good days at least, when I am able to see clearly and to understand.

On such days I sit quietly on my threadbare carpet, my attention focused on the past. It takes a little patience to bring to life scenes from those days. Some of them I recall with remarkable clarity – scenes which I no longer knew I had been through, or could, in fact, be found within my body´s memory: snippets of conversation, colours of the weather – joy. Then I try to write everything down. Sometimes I have to laugh, then I forget to write, and on occasions the scenes evaporate before I get a grip on them.

When, on occasions, a sublime and sweet giggle rises up exquisitely in my worn body, I realize it was worth going long distances, ignoring borders or violating laws. And while this instrument – dark and dignified in tone and colour – speaks to me benignly, I forget the moments of despair when I have quarrelled with the rusted and cursed strings and have produced only discord – in myself and others.

There is a similarity there between the shine and the tone of the old, chapped and cracked wood, with its blunt shellac, and the patina of my aging soul. Gradually, and as I hang as if crucified behind this ancient instrument, the sound has begun to influence most of my life´s decisions. This has provided me with some confidence – for short periods of time, at least. For India did not accept me with open arms – India rejected me, chastened, denied, despised, mocked, beat, insulted, used, excluded me, puked me out – and blessed me.

Part One

The Teacher, His Student, and the White Mogul

Health Resort in Nagpur

Even much later, it had never become quite clear to Jasmin Quresh whether the specific beauty of her perfect breasts and the curves of her hips, which nature had endowed her with, had been a blessing or a curse. But they had put the male world at her feet; that much was for certain. That life would have a lot in store for her, this she had already known as a young girl in East Pakistan. She had heard about certain things: travel, designer clothes, jewellery, a car – things she considered as basic for her way of life.

She looked out between the curtains over Cumballa Hill and the Arabian Sea, deliberating whether to plug in the phone. Some of the men she called ´her clients´ were quite often in the mood for an early morning session. She turned on the radio.

Akashuani hai … a program of classical Hindustani music …

Around this time of morning there was this damp mist in the coconut trees – a perfect mood for listening to sitar sounds. These are lovely sitar sounds, she thought – a cheap luxury to be had, just by switching the radio on. Perhaps I should go and see that Khan wallah performing. But first a little beauty rest before the heat sets in – and before they start calling. Today was Friday, and she would go to the Haji Ali Mosque in the afternoon and yes, perhaps to that concert later in the evening.

Common prostitutes, with their make-up and their bright colours, you didn’t find in this area near Nariman Point. Jasmin despised them; she considered herself to be in a different league. Her cream linen suits, her crepe de chine saris, her discreet jewellery were all evidence of this. Only a European bra provided the protruding bust, which, she knew, never escaped the prospective client´s attention. In the warm evening wind, on those neon-bright nights under palm trees, she mingled with the promenading middle classes, the tourists, the flirty teenagers. She usually found the lone man in the silk kurta, the Marwari jeweller from Gujarat, the turbaned Sikh from the Punjab, the burnous-wearing Arab gentleman from Abu Dhabi. A slightly longer gaze, a lingering pause at a shop window was enough. May I invite you for a drink?

Jasmin was never impatient with the men; with a smile she fulfilled their expectations, and as for the high price, there was no hourly rate or anything, only a price per session. They were never shocked when money was mentioned; for some reason, they seemed relieved when they heard the hard facts. What was expected of her usually took place quite swiftly – the punters wanted to get back to work, family, friends, or wife, as soon as possible. Jasmin considered her work to be therapeutic, or else a higher, more refined type of acting which was simply applied to real life. Since she was a master in her field, no one saw through her role. She kept her secret as carefully as her rupees, pounds, dollars, her Kruegerrand gold coins, and her diamonds. Occasionally, in moments of silence such as these, she reflected on her life: what else could she have done? What other profession, what vocation could have been hers? ´Princess´ was the only other thing she could think of – and spa retreat owner. It was not her fault that karma had made a mistake – a mistake in misplacing her in East Pakistan, where climate and politics would have kept her so terribly, terribly removed from her ideals of comfort and style. She never, ever despised the men who were so utterly crazy about her, in the same way that she never completely gave up on the romantic idea of an ideal husband: perhaps one day that maharaja, or at least a raja would come along. Early childhood impressions of the downmarket area of Dacca: the many siblings, the tin sheds, the mangy stray dogs, the school children in rags, Dad in his grey-washed, shabby vest, treadling his bicycle rickshaw. She buried these memories forcefully; none of this she allowed back into her conscience, nor any ambiguities as to the value system of her teenage years. Cash is king in this world.

Ever since she had accepted her life as a call girl and taken pleasure in that secret power over men, the beautiful clothes, and everything else that life in Bombay had in store for her, she liked to indulge in moments like these when she could enjoy, all on her own, the peace and quiet that material comfort and security had to offer: resting on a luxury bed, listening to sitar sounds, and looking down over the beehive that was Bombay from her high-rise apartment.

The political tensions between the two states of Pakistan had served her in an almost cynical fashion: they had enabled her to leave Dacca at thirteen to seek refuge with her relatives in Mahim, where she could start a new life. This would be a normal life, with all the normal things of middle-class Bombay: a fridge, a television, a cook and servants.

Uncle and Auntie, the Zulfiqars, both worked hard. Bibi Zulfiqar was an art dealer; she owned a gallery in Cumballa Hill. Zulfiqar Ali, her husband, was a screenwriter for Hindi films. He worked at home. Jasmin thought that Uncle Ali was joking when, one afternoon during Auntie Bibi´s absence, he said that he wanted to see her naked.

Five hundred rupees.

He smelled of whisky and fish curry. The whisky, perhaps, being the reason for this bold foray. He smiled and put his hand in his trouser pocket. Deep inside, Jasmin knew that somehow Uncle Ali represented her future. She was also aware that she owed her relatives, as they had taken care of her so kindly. Zulfiqar Ali saw what he wanted to see, and she reached for the money.

Another five hundred if you let me lather you in the shower.

It did not take long before Jasmin understood. The arrangement continued, and his contributions soon amassed to a bundle of rupee notes, which she kept in an old tea caddy in her padlocked metal chest. Whenever Uncle Ali had writer´s block, he walked into the room where she did her homework. It was almost always the same little momentary games that he wanted to play. Once he wanted to see her sticking her fountain pen in her anus; another time he wanted to watch her peeing in the shower, with him standing by with his towering penis. Aunt Bibi knew nothing – or if she suspected anything, she didn´t say.

Very soon Jack Apollo Bunder got wind of Jasmin´s activities at Cumballa Hill. It was his business to know certain things, what with him being active at all levels of Bombay society. Members of the Vice Squad owed him, naturally. And Zulfikar Ali was a friend of the Mafia wallah – and Ali liked to brag. This was how Jack Apollo had found out about Jasmin´s background and career.

Money ruled the world – but who ruled the money? Hidden deep inside Jasmin was a Muslima – one who found certainty in Islam, a certainty that other people did not enjoy. This certainty was the fact that God was behind it all. But on Friday, after her visit to the Haji Ali mosque, she also went, for good measure, to the temple of Mumba Devi in Bhuleshwar, which was in the middle of the clothes market to the south of the metropolis.

She knew what Uncle Ali liked. If she didn´t, he would tell her. He liked it best when she acted shy and innocent, pausing a little before undressing completely. Euphemisms were invented in a cheerful manner: when he wanted to stroke her breasts, he called it ´Mango Season´, and with ´Ice Cream Stick´ he made sure Jasmin didn´t get pregnant. It was good – each time it all lasted only a few moments and afterwards, he busied himself with his manuscripts again.

Over time her rupee bundles began to fatten, and on her eighteenth birthday she bought herself a pair of high-heeled shoes. Thus equipped she took a taxi to the Union Bank of India to seek advice about investment opportunities. With the remaining sum of twenty thousand rupees, she bought diamonds, commercial grade yellow, at the Jaweri Bazaar. These she kept in a small green velvet pouch in her metal chest. At the age of nineteen, she fabricated a career as an airline stewardess, said good-bye to the Zulfiqars, and moved into the apartment at Nariman Point.

She was a princess, not a ‘kerb swallow’. For relatives and customers she was a stewardess with Singapore Airlines. She had learned about discretion and was able to read and correctly interpret the signals given off by men. Always dressed in white or cream, she stayed close to Bombay University, but she did not study anything. With her innocent face, her tall, lean, but well-proportioned body, and her beautiful neck, her appearance suggested an honourable student from a good family. She maintained this image with great care so as not to attract pimps. Within the clean halls of the neo-Gothic building she did not attract attention, but the area was frequented by wealthy men carrying thick bundles of rupee or dollar bills. By using the sixth sense of an older soul, it wasn´t hard to identify them; it was even less difficult to fulfill the fantasies and projections of the men, to see through and compute their expectations. Her makeup was subtle.

One day an Arab sheik found her in the University cafeteria. He was looking for a companion for one week. She would not regret it, he assured her. In a long black limousine she was taken to Juhu Beach, beyond the Sun ´n´ Sand, to a bungalow with direct access to the sea. His name was Khalid. He did not want to see her naked; instead, she was obliged to put on a black Arab robe and headscarf cover, so that only her face was showing. He asked her to lift the robe and he took some photos. On the days that followed, she accompanied Khalid, who was a member of some royal family, to the movies, to parties, and to Indian classical music concerts. After that, he wanted her to dress in Arabic clothes again, but this time he wanted to watch her being ´raped´ by a young Danish hippie, while the master of the house and his friends watched behind one-way mirrors, enjoying whisky and cocaine. But the hippie had dirty feet and fingernails, and he smelled. She received some gold coins, which she exchanged the next morning for a handsome wad of one thousand rupee notes at the Union Bank of India, Bombay Branch.

Her plan was to pursue this profession for three years – exactly three years. She would stick rigidly to this structure, for this was the only anchor in her life. A survey she had seen in the Indian Express spoke of a high suicide rate among prostitutes, a rate as high as eighty percent. Besides, men would always go for new generations of eighteen year olds. She had to discipline herself and operate in accordance with that precise plan, which included a small health spa hotel in Nagpur as the targeted objective. She had been to Nagpur once with Uncle Ali and Auntie Zulfiqar. There, on the edge of the jungle area, south of Nagpur, she would build her spa.

When Khalid picked her up again in his big limousine, she thought nothing of it. But instead of the beach bungalow, she was taken to the Juhu Aerodrome and hurried aboard a private plane. As the aircraft turned above the Arabian Sea towards the northeast, Khalid held her hand and smiled.

We´re going home, do not worry I will give you a great time, a good time and good money! Jasmin felt no fear. Although they had flown out at dusk, they descended into Dubai International Airport a few hours later, when it was still twilight. A sedan with tinted windows took them to a house in the centre of the modern city. Behind a high white wall, free from noise, was concealed an elegant garden in the old Arabic style, with crickets chirping and birds singing. My second city residence. Khalid clapped his hands and a barefoot servant, Indian or Pakistani, appeared. A drink for the lady!

Khalid disappeared and returned after some time, dressed in a white djellaba. He seemed relaxed and cheerful. Come, take a shower, cool off! I have not bought you, I have only rented you … I want you to be happy! Are we not alive to be happy?

In the evening there was a party for Khalid and his friends. Seven men, all dressed in noble djellabas and kaftans, laid down their burnouses, and smoked hookahs. To the sound of the Qanūn, and the rhythm of the darabuka, in the tobacco smoke rising up from the glowing charcoal, Jasmin performed her striptease. But then Khalid´s friends grabbed her head and raised their djellabas. The friends cheered each other and clapped their hands enthusiastically, as one effusion after another disfigured her face. Later she watched the stars through her bedroom window; but in front of her, before the starry sky, there were the metal bars. After two weeks, Khalid drove with her along the Al-Dhayed Road, east into the desert, up to Al-Tayebah and further into the barren mountains of Al Manamah. My second summer residence. Jasmin began to understand that she was a prisoner: without papers, without rights, a slave. She tried to focus her thoughts. She needed to be constantly ready for an opportunity to escape.

Khalid had organized another party. Grilled goat and a huge rice table in the style of the Bedouins had been prepared. This time the guests were more brutal; they slapped her face and kicked her when she refused to immediately comply with their wishes. Jasmin cried and wanted to leave. On the way back Khalid apologized and gave her a beautiful ruby ring, encased in heavy gold. At night she dreamed of Bangladesh and her poor parents.

One night, Tando, the Pakistani guard, knocked on her door. Bombay girl, he said, you are far from Churchgate. Jasmin asked him if he could help her escape. He thought for a moment, then he said in Hindi, Day after tomorrow when Master Khalid office going, be ready … Give me this ring! He knelt down and lifted his sarong, groaned and grunted, then disappeared. A few days later when Khalid had left the house, Tando appeared and told her to get ready. On the street corner a Toyota pick-up was waiting for her. The driver immediately took off. After a half an hour’s drive through desert landscape, they came to a settlement surrounded by barbed wire. ´No Visitors´, a sign in the driveway said. It was an ugly concrete building. Buildings of this type were considered to be modern by westernized Arabs, but were soon turned into cheap accommodation for migrant workers from Southeast Asia. There were rusted car wrecks round the back, partially obscured by desert sand.

On a small metal plate on the dented bell she could read a name: W. Salim.

He is my relative, an Indian businessman, Tando said. He will bring you back to Bombay. But Salim was not a business man and he was not Indian. Six feet tall, and dressed in a dark blue, dirty kaftan, he did not look like an Indian, more like an Eastern European, with his big belly, reddish hair and large head. On his cheeks dark spots of poorly-healed acne were showing, typical of someone who lived almost exclusively on fast food. His nose was thick and blue from alcohol. His eyes were the colour of lead. Jasmin stared in bewilderment at the man who was peeling off dirham notes from a thick wad and handing them to Tando. As the two men went outside, she heard Tando demand more money. First class meat – first class!

When Salim came back, she wanted to know when he would take her to Bombay. The big man ignored the question, pulling her hair instead, and shouted, What do you know! He tore her underwear to pieces and whipped her with his belt.

In the room there was only a portable radio with an antenna and two stained mattresses. On one, a white-skinned European girl with a sallow complexion was sitting smoking Marlboros. The finished butts had been carefully lined up on the side of her mattress, creating a small forest of cigarette ends. The dirty mattresses, a few plastic water bottles and several buckets were all that furnished the room. Jasmin went directly to the window. The girl read her thoughts. Forget it, you aren´t going nowhere. She stretched out a thin hand. I´m Rosy.

Looking out of the window, Jasmin was able to identify the strange smell: in the outbuildings behind bars, several apes were chained up. Arabic rhythms resonated from the small portable radio. Rosy sat up and said, You know why they keep these orangutans, don´t you? Jasmin didn´t know and didn´t want to know.

Rosy fiddled with the small radio. The Arabic gibberish coming from it reminded her of religious education during her early years in Dacca. Koranic verses followed. Al-Mujib – the One who always answers your prayers. The name made her think of Sheikh Mudjibur Rahman, the Prime Minister of Bangladesh, who had recently been killed. She bowed down slowly, right to the dirty floor until her nose reached the ground, and then she spoke silently. Help me! She didn´t mean the prime minister. The shortwave hissed and crackled, a deep hum surfaced, shreds of Chinese or Mongolian languages, or was it Persian, or Afghani? Suddenly tanpoura sounds emerged. This was All India Radio! „… Ustad Nizam Khan got fed up with the Bombay party scene, and made for the hills …"

Tabla sounds emerged, then a sitar ostinato of three, four notes, pulsating between silvery single strokes. With jubilant softness Nizam Khan´s sitar created a melodic pattern in raga Shahana Kanhra, his music rising like a kite in the wind.

Rosy lit another Marlboro and sucked the smoke through her teeth noisily.

Hey, I know this guy! We was down the Queen Elizabeth Hall, listened to his playing there – this guy´s somning else. Yes, Jasmin thought, getting absorbed in the sound for a moment – yes, there is something in this music, something that makes time stand still, something that changes everything from black and white into colour.

The key rattled in the lock and Salim appeared. He was not alone, but with an elderly man, an Arab with a silver-grey beard and a burnouse on his head.

You go with him! said Salim to Jasmin, nudging her with his foot. The old man shoved her into a Mercedes and drove a few miles along a wide motorway. Now and then he turned his eyes from the street and glanced greedily at her legs and her hips. At a red traffic light near the Dubai Islamic Bank Building by the Bur Juman Centre, she jumped out of the car and ran along the hot Dubai asphalt until she reached a kind of shopping mall. An office – Consulate General of the Federal Republic of Germany – proved to be the closest refuge.

An official in a grey suit and tie, who introduced himself as Herr Stein, noted everything down. He picked up the phone and started speaking in a harsh language that Jasmin had never heard before. Mr Stein put his hand over the mouthpiece and smiled stiffly. Germany, he said.

Applications had to be filled out. Jasmin told him everything. He asked her a series of questions and took notes. Intercourse and proscribed sexual practices. Herr Stein needed to look for further questionnaires and forms. Beischlaf und beischlafähnliche Handlungen. Jasmin wrote her name and simply added Mudjibur Rahman. Herr Stein´s face lit up. He said, Your two sisters have already immigrated to Germany. Do you want to immigrate to Germany, too? He spoke loudly, as if by doing so she would understand his clumsy English better. She thought about it for a moment, imagining ´Germany´ as a kind of Bombay, only with white, stiff people who spoke this consonant-rich language. She shook her head.

Bombay, please.

* * *

The concert would be a kind of pilgrimage for Jasmin. His music had brought about her rescue from a desperate situation; now she wanted to see this musician in person. A man who played music of this kind had to be a high Sufi. See who he is, she thought, hear his music and, if possible, speak to him. She had decided to change her life. She would stop going with men for money. She would study and explore her own culture. This concert would be just the beginning.

The programme was supposed to start at eight; by nine o`clock at the Sanmukhanandan Hall, the musicians were still not on the stage. Jasmin hoped that this would not be one of those evenings that she´d heard of, where some capricious maestro would not be in ´the right mood´ for playing. But then finally, and at long last, Nizam Khan-Sahib appeared, accompanied by a large entourage, including a white hippie boy.

His concert was the great Inward Journey that everybody had been on about. The maestro did his work. Auspicious inner cities were being explored. Listeners were delighted and transformed. Jasmin was convinced that he had been playing exclusively for her, and when she saw him in the dressing room afterwards, she felt that he had, in fact, been waiting for her.

Nizam Khan-Sahib beamed in his post-concert halo as Jasmin bowed down before him and reverently touched his feet, handing over flowers.

What do you do?

I´m a flight attendant.

Do you also play music? (Young ladies from ´good´ families often practised singing or instrumental music at home.)

No, Jasmin answered truthfully, lowering her eyelids chastely. I only play tanpoura …

Would you play the tanpoura for me? Nizam´s eyebrows wiggled like Groucho Marx´. Wouldn´t it be a nice idea to have a little drink together later on?

The wedding took place a month later, and Jasmin became Nizam´s second wife. She was known as his ´Khanum´, as the concubines of the Mogul emperors were called. There were sweets, bejewelled ladies, guests of honour, the Bombay intellectuals, the elderly Khan-Sahibs with their walking sticks, the obligatory culinary binge, a group of virtuoso musicians from Rajasthan, the local imam, gifts, flowers, and incense, a honking Ambassador convoy, feeding the poor, the TV reporter from the Federal Republic of Germany, (who also wanted to see the slums) – all in one long, full-moon night. Dunja, the older Memsahib, looked on silently from the edge of the events, keeping her thoughts to herself. Nobody expected enthusiasm from her.

Fatehgar I

Fatehgar, India

February 1976

Sometimes there are moments in music where the actual music takes place subliminally, independently, and somewhat removed from the music that is being performed. And after a certain time, a change in the atmosphere takes place, such as the change that occurs with the first intimate contact between two people, when they are about to enter into a close relationship. After that, nothing is as it was.

On one of those timeless Indian days of dusty heat and ancient sky, Nizam Khan, master of the Indian lute, found himself in a congenial environment: he gave a concert in a palace – strictly speaking, in the music room of the palace. Here he played the majestic raga Marva, the twilight raga, at the ´hour of the cow dust´.

Within the realm of this ancient melody, he played with the echoes of the notes, and the aura of his instrument: delicately undulating sounds emerged and reflected from walls that were covered with gold leaf.

The palace, a monster made of marble and sandstone, was personally designed by an eccentric raja before the First World War. It was an adventurous mix of styles: Mogul, Victorian, neo-Gothic, Greco-Roman. But this was only at first glance – the longer your gaze stayed with the floral patterns, in which garlands met with Corinthian capitals, and with the twisted columns of greasy white marble, you began to feel the curious harmonic balance of the interior.

In the same off-beat manner Nizam Khan´s sitar phrases snaked, wiggled, and meandered under and around the dome. Halfway up, the notes met with the gold leaf of the walls and the glazed dark mahogany panelling; oily, dull, vaguely shiny from so much dusting. Only upon closer inspection one noticed that the paint on the walls was slightly chipped in places from many monsoons, and the carpets had become somewhat threadbare. Elephant tusks, set in gold, stuck out of priceless sapphire-blue Mogul rugs. The old Maharaja, the builder of the palace, had still worn the turban, and flowery, brocade-like embroidered robes that reached down to his ankles. The old man had hunted the tiger; his guests, however, had to content themselves with a stuffed leopard for shooting pleasure; this leopard was rushed back and forth, mounted on a trolley. For the guests this presented an opportunity to take part in the thrill of the chase. But the eccentric host of the tiny principality, who resided in the last third of the twentieth century in Fatehgar, was perhaps more of an animal lover than a philanthropist.

After his visitors had departed, he started feeling more comfortable. It was then he could focus once again undisturbed on his passions: Urdu poetry and the practice of classical sitar music.

Next time you must stay longer! This was his customary good-bye. This nicety, however, he kept to himself until the departing guests were safely and comfortably sitting in the waiting train compartment, all ready to leave, with the locomotive panting steam. Next time you must stay longer!

When he drove the Rolls Royce, an early model, at a dignified pace back to the palace, the driver, in uniform and gloves, was instructed to watch out for country folk in particular, for they had recently developed a tendency to throw themselves in front of the wheels of the Rolls – ever since the family of a woman who´d been hit by the vehicle had been compensated with a small bowl of gold coins from the raja´s treasury.

In honour of the master of the house, the sitar master has begun to unfold a chand, a ´horse training´, on his instrument. The rhythm dances evenly as Nizam Khan fills the interstices of the slow pace with economical strokes: notes that move steadily, yet snake-like, across the gat melody. Now and again he places, like a precisely organized traditional ritual, chikari strokes. Poised and with confidence he weaves Urdu poetry of mysterious and ambiguous content into the music. The singing is replicated on the sitar: dark colours, finest filigree lines in silver on anthracite, ambivalent tones of alizarin and deep purple.

A shadow is on my chest,

but someone is behind me -

I´m in your life,

but someone is praying for me -

I´m close to someone,

but someone understands me.

Nizam Khan leaves the strong and important strokes to the tabla player, who now gets his opportunity to demonstrate virtuosity. The tabla player, not content with this state of affairs, cheekily decodes the rhythm pattern laid down by the Khan, and subsequently unfolds it in a new way entirely until it turns into a floating sphere in a magnetic field.

This represented a challenge to the Khan-Sahib who, with X-ray eyes, quickly discerned spinning wheels within rhythmic wheels, and how those were aligned, and how gravity centres constantly fell in place at certain points of the time-scale. Before his mind´s eye the whole affair turned into a flower garland. Chubby. Tight. Gaudy. The heads of the ladies and gentlemen present sway and nod in agreement, moaning pleasurably.

The Khan-Sahib also nodded; initially approving with enthusiasm, then encouragingly, and finally somewhat mockingly, in the face of this brazen undertaking on the part of the percussionist who had impertinently challenged him before this illustrious group of connoisseurs. While his right – the staccato pounding rhythm hand – kept the long cycle going almost automatically, apart from certain minor accents, Nizam Khan´s left reached for a pack of Rothmans International and nimbly fished out a cigarette, which he threw up in the air and most elegantly and naturally caught with his mouth. Immediately, lighters flared. From all sides flames were held out to him, like the morning worship at Hindu temples. After a long moment the Khan-Sahib nodded towards a young man in a white Mogul costume; a Farenghi, a thin, long-haired European who, extending a small bow, enjoyed the honour of lighting the famous musician´s cigarette.

Meanwhile, the tabla player, now deprived of the listeners’ attention, began whirling and swirling wildly, gesturing that he wished to increase the musical pace. This constituted an affront towards a Khan-Sahib! Smiling gently, Nizam Khan replenished increasingly larger parts of the composition with fast runs in quadruplicate speed, prompting mustachioed men, and women in silk robes, who were reclining on thick sausage cushions, to expel pleasurable growls. Kya baat hai!

But when everyone expected yet a further increase in speed, Khan-Sahib did the opposite: he peened chikari patterns and worked with repetitions. And he played softly. With this newly obtained intimacy the repeated patterns gained a new quality, demonstrating to the audience previously ignored aspects of the music. With each repetition the music now became more interesting – and blissful. Every note brought further side-lights. Men from the eighteenth century wearing delicately colourful angarika kurtas made from embroidered Madeira cloth were chanting poetry. Premonitions – like the scent of good quality rose oil – seeped down from the high walls of the main hall of the palace where the marble of the grid-like filigree work was broken and where, in former times, the women of the zenana had been given an opportunity, at least indirectly, and in a one-sided way, to participate in performances such as these.

Now, in a ghostly manner, and eerily motionless, ibexes, tigers, buffalos, elks, rhinos, and leopards looked down on the musical soiree. A foggy, dim glow emanated from the gigantic Venetian glass chandeliers, providing just enough light to make Nizam´s four carat on his right hand glitter blue, green, and red. This was the way Nizam Khan-Sahib could bring dignity, meaning, and energy to a dusty old ruin: his music and poetry reawakened ancient times and produced amazing memories within the minds of the listeners.

After having reduced melody and lyrics to no more than three or four notes, having examined them from a number of perspectives, coloured them with side-notes, dyed, twisted and turned, polished and chased the nondescript, manipulated the palatable in order to make it infinitely precious, and after he´d made his audience into hungry and thirsty subjects, having administered each and every note like delicious food, he straightened his body. Cross-legged, he stretched up to maximum height one last time. Everyone knew that a special musical treat was bound to follow.

I invented the echo!

Ahaaa!

The audience nodded attentively and expectantly as Nizam demonstrated small melodic fragments of raga, adding a number of repetitions at decreasing volume. What was, in fact, a simple stitch, was thus transformed into a delicacy at the time of ecstasy and rapture: a person in love does not find it difficult to write a love poem using plain words.

Nizam Khan, who often enough used well-prepared runs and applications, now started playing adventurously – his music turning into poetry: heavy and compelling. Upheld by enthusiasm, he made the guests participate in the creative process by making up absurdly comical experiments from simple folk melodies.