THE MAX CLOUTH CLAN WITH VARIJASHREE VENUGOPAL

For Hyderabad Western Music Foundation/hydmusic.com/ 6/3/2017

     The hospitable and picturesque environs of the Sailing Annexe - Secunderabad Club, was opened to the music of the Max Clouth Clan on the evening of the 4^th of March 2017, and the Club was chock-a-block with fortunate listeners who had come to hear this terrifically talented German guitar trio.

    The Max Clouth Clan was, Max Clouth on Guitar, Jonathan Sell, Bass, and Martin Standke, drums.

     The Clan’s playing was stellar and the sound superb. Not just the band’s 

sound, but also of the perfectly balanced sound system. 

     Best of all was the Clan’s super-empathy that could be delivered only by players who are familiar with each other and play and jell together. Jonathan Sell on Bass and Martin Standke on drums provided a solid, inventive, melodic bass backbone and a shifting, swinging pulse that drove all the music forward like a swinging, swaying yet steady locomotive.

     The Max Clouth Clan, on first hearing, appeared to be mixing styles and crossing boundaries, the guitar had the gritty bite and bluesy yet smooth overdriven tone of a rock guitar, but through it all there was an unmistakable jazz sensibility that pervaded the music.

     Max Clouth played his own compositions, one of them, he had announced, was called ‘Noon’ that he had composed while waiting for a student in a German classroom. But all the compositions they played were tangy and tasty, and had a controlled and deliberate rough edge to them within the composer’s conception of his music which alternated between jam band music, rock, and sizzling, swinging jazz. And though they only played their own original compositions, I did hear references to a novel rendition of the classic ‘Summertime’.

     It is the second half of the concert that was remarkable surprise. The Clan was joined by a genre-busting phenomenon named Varijashree Venugopal, a young, yet well recognized Carnatic vocalist from Bengaluru with a love of Jazz.

     Varijashree Venugopal and the Clan explored Carnatic music, and though it was obvious that she was a true Carnatic classical vocalist, it became apparent that Max Clouth had also studied Indian classical music and was familiar with its syntax.

     Varijashree’s vocalisation in the arrangement of “Krishna Nee Begane Baro” composed by Saint Purandara Dasa in Kannada in Raag Yaman and on another one (a Carnatic composition), Amba Para Devate, in Raaga Rudrapriya, composed by Sri Krishnaswami Ayya, was consummate, and her voice was light and airy, her vocal inflections precise, delicate and rapid as the wing beat of a hovering hummingbird and her voice as melodious as a Malabar Whistling Thrush.

     The compositions were melodious and syncopated and Max Clouth changed the  tone of his guitar for this session to a more sweet and mellow tone to match the singers voice, The Clan, especially Max Clouth followed the singer with accuracy and understanding, and was able to take the singers fluid improvisation and the uncluttered linear conception forward smoothly.

     And though some jazz purists, or Carnatic classical music aficionados, may not have been pleased with this fusion, to this listener it was matchless. This kind of music, if listened to with attentiveness, I think, would unlock, engage, and provoke listeners’ imaginations and help open their minds. 

     The Secunderabad Club, Goethe Zentrum and the Hyderabad Western Music Foundation deserve kudos for bringing us lucky listeners this luminous experience. 

Photographs and video's - Joe Koster

You can listen to the Max Clouth Clan on youtube - Lassi

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ODUj4xpknOE

With Varijashree Venugopal

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=986pd8B2mYg