Photos: Mahindra Percussion Festival, Bengaluru Kicked Off One Big Drum Circle

Between the 11 drum risers and five drum kits set up on stage at the first edition of Mahindra Percussion Festival in Bengaluru on March 18th, we saw a lot of energy transpire. Bringing together Indian and global stalwarts of rhythm, the day-long event kicked off rapturously with Kerala’s Chemmeen Band ft Aatam Kalasamithi.

While they had medleys and folk songs alike in their energetic set to get the crowd off their relaxed places on the grass, master artist A. Shivamani brought his eccentric versatility to the stage next. From live looping to electronics and all kinds of instruments (including an empty water keg), the artist did it all to keep the audience guessing.

The format of the Mahindra Percussion Festival played out like one big drum circle, with one artist passing the baton on to another through jams. The drum trio Pulse Conversations — Gino Banks, Jai Row Kavi and Vinayak Pol — came in on a Bollywood jam of “Chaiyya Chaiyya” and took off in a power-packed direction, aided by saxophonist Mark Hartsuch and bassist Mohini Dey, with the duo being a fixture at different points of the festival’s performances.

The trio of drummers then welcomed an even more diverse artist — mridangam player, producer, konnakol proponent Viveick Rajagopalan. With surging effect, his Ta Dhom Project with rappers Dehaati, Khoj and Artslord brought in a different, current flavor of percussion-meets-hip-hop. They even dedicated “Get Up and Dance” to former Ta Dhom Project member and MC Tod Fod, from multilingual crew Swadesi.

Although Selvaganesh had a particularly short solo performance, he jammed with festival curator and drummer Ranjit Barot, which segued into the Paquito Ensemble taking the stage. Percussionist Paquito Gonzalez first jammed with Barot, but soon brought in flamenco guitarist Jose Quevedo aka Bolita and dancer Antonio Molina aka El Choro. It brought the Mahindra Percussion Festival arguably at its high point, with a quite literally stomping performance from the trio.

Armenia-origin American artist Arto Tunçboyacıyan was nimble in his approach, even using an empty beer bottle to add to the versatility shown on stage at the festival. While Barot had earlier traversed funk, jazz, pop and fusion during his performance, there was an all-star closing jam to end the festival, perhaps carrying the tradition forward from the Mahindra Blues festival.

While the festival ran a tight ship and gave plenty of artists the space to shine on stage, there was a full house of audiences across ages present at Jayamahal Palace Hotel grounds. With food and beverage starting up early, a good crowd had built right from the early evening. The only drawback was the absence of any free water stations, which was also missed at Shakti’s 50th anniversary show at the same venue, organized by showrunners Hyperlink Brand Solutions. Nevertheless, the Mahindra Percussion Festival becomes yet another addition to the growing Mahindra family of music festivals — they’ve now got Mahindra Blues, Mahindra Independence Rock and Mahindra Roots all together, making for one formidable calendar.

Photos: Courtesy of Mahindra Percussion Festival