Bangla attack on minorities: Novel protest thro' beatboxing

Kolkata: MOUTH percussion or mouth drumming is something he loves and relishes performing and it is with mouth drumming, he enthrals the audience all over the world. But this time round, Pandit Prodyut Mukherjee, recipient of the Global India Music Academy Award (GiMA Award) and Pandit Manmohan Bhatt Memorial Award, chose to perform this art for a different reason altogether- not for entertaining the audience, but for putting across a message.

The recent attack on minorities in Bangladesh during the Durgapuja prompted the famed music composer and director to voice his protest in a novel way- mouth drumming for a private digital channel-CalCalling. "Mouth drumming is a form of vocal percussion or beatboxing, which involves vocally imitating the sound of a drum kit as precisely as possible in order to use the voice to serve the same function as a drummer in a musical setting. I have been performing this for years together across the world, by creating sounds of a moving train, train coming to a halt, and movement of two trains on side by side track, thunderstorm, rain drops, 'maddening crowd's ignoble strife', train moving through a bridge, so on and so forth. But this time I thought of doing it for a purpose and symbolically. I tried to create a sound as an expression of anguish and protest by slapping my own cheek," says Pandit Mukherjee.

Mukherjee, who from a young age, has been accompanying all the leading performers of Hindustani Classical Music including Mohan Veena Maestro Padmabhushan Pt Vishwamohan Bhatt, Ustad Shahid Parvez Khan, Ustad Nishat Khan and many more and collaborated with Odissi Exponent Dona Ganguly, Ghazal and Bhajan exponent Anup Jalota, Suresh Wadker, Shaan, Kishore Sodha and many others on many projects, has always been socially conscious, responsible and sensitive.

Founder of RHYTHMEXPRESS, Pandit Mukherjee recently released a music video with Dhaakis of Bengal, dhaak being one of the main rhythmic instrument of Bengal. Conceived by Sudipto Chanda and directed by Soumyadeep Sarkar and Arun Halder, Mukherjee's music video, released on the occasion of the 50th year of the social organisation-Khukumani', had a team of brilliant dhaakis like Paresh Das, Anil Das, Manojit Das, Sunil Das, Shyamal Das, Jyotsna Thandar (in conch), and artists from Chhinath Bahurupi- Subal Das Bairagya, Dhandeswar Das.

"Dhaak is part of our cultural heritage. Ironically, the dhaakis suffered financial setback and other losses during the pandemic. So the whole idea was to offer whatever little support we can and to show our respect to their cultural heritage," says Mukherjee.

He is also actively involved with The Society for the Promotion of Indian Classical Music & Culture Amongst Youth (SPIC MACAY), a voluntary youth movement, promoting intangible aspects of Indian cultural heritage through promotion of Indian classical music, classical dance, folk music, yoga, meditation, crafts and so on.