Gig review/ International Jazz Day 2025, Mumbai

BY NARENDRA KUSNUR

International Jazz Day 2025, Mumbai/ Curated by Louiz Banks

Performers: Louiz Banks Ensemble feat. Sivamani & Isheeta Chakrvarty, the Ranjit Barot Quartet, the Sanjay Divecha Trio

Genre: Jazz, world music, fusion

Details; St Andrew's Auditorium, Bandra, April 30

Rating; ****

Appropriately, drums and percussion were at the forefront of the International Jazz Day show concert, which paid tribute to tabla legend Ustad Zakir Hussain. Like every year, the show was curated by jazz maestro Louiz Banks, and the major attractions this time were drummers Sivamani and Ranjit Barot.

The annual event on April 30 was initially held at Blue Frog, Lower Parel, before being held at the Tata Theatre of the National Centre for the Performing Arts (NCPA), Nariman Point. This year it moved further north to St Andrew's Auditorium in Bandra. One could actually see a different audience, many of who are regulars at the venue.

Organised by Gigatainment, comprising Neil Banks and Jadyn Banks, the show began by paying homage to Hussain with everyone observing two minutes' silence. A large picture of the maestro stood in one corner. The show was hosted by actor-stage personality Denzil Smith.

The Sanjay Divecha Trio, comprising Sanjay on guitar, Shashank Das on bass and Adrian D'Souza on drums, began the proceedings. Sanjay immediately hit form on 'Tales From Angeles', and was charming on the melodic 'Afrika'. His composition 'Shining Light' was dedicated to late keyboardist Karan Joseph. Sanjay's clear notes and smooth improvisation were perfectly balanced by the rhythm section.

Ranjit Barot had an interesting line-up with Bihu Mukherjee on congos, and Arko Chakraborty and Alstan Remedios on keys. He began with an improvised version of 'Supernova', originally dedicated to tabla maestro Ustad Allarakha, and followed it up with '13th Night' and 'Emerge'. The keyboard parts were reminiscent of 1970s fusion acts like Weather Report and Chick Corea though the overall flavour had clear elements of contemporary world music. with seamless coordination between the traditional kit and congadrums.

Post-interval, Louiz Banks was joined by Isheeta Chakrvarty on vocals, Sivamani on drums, Manas Kumar on violin, Sheldon D'Silva on bass and Unmesh Banerjee on tabla. Isheeta showed fabulous control on the sargams of the first number 'Shadows', and Sivamani displayed his much-expected energy and showmanship on his solo. For the finale, the musicians were joined by Fazal Qureshi on tabla, Taufiq Qureshi on djembe and Shikhar Naad Qureshi on percussion, thereby adding the family representation to the Zakir Bhai tribute. 

The good thing was that the show restricted itself to just three line-ups, instead of having too many changeovers. As such the genres were clearly demarcated, and each act got a good share of the time. The sound quality was fabulous too, but that's expected at St Andrew's.

This year, Jazz Day shows have taken place in Delhi-NCR, Goa, Bengaluru, Kolkata and other Indian cities. In Mumbai itself, there were two shows featuring four acts at the Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre (NMACC) on Sunday, April 27. Bonobo in Bandra had planned an after-party after the Andrew's gig but that was cancelled after a major fire in the vicinity the previous day. BlueBop Café in Khar hosted a jazz night with bassist Avishek Dey and his Trio.

On Saturday, May 3, guitarist Adil Manuel is curating a Jazz Day show at AntiSocial in Lower Parel. The line-up is in the flier below. With so much happening, we might as well start calling it the International Jazz Week.