Vishwa Mohan Bhatt unveils the Vishwaveena

Rang Barse, a two-day Hindustani concert festival beginning in Delhi on Thursday, will showcase the varying calibre of its practitioners, ranging from the 89-year-old Gangubai Hangal to budding instrumentalists Fateh Ali and Murad Ali, barely out of their teens.

The rare event -- with the theme Mothers and Daughters: Fathers and Sons -- will also witness the introduction of a new instrument, the Vishwaveena. Invented by Grammy awardee Pandit Vishwa Mohan Bhatt, the instrument is an improvisation over the guitar, yet different from the Mohan Veena he successfully produced the last decade.

"The festival aims to show that an Amjad Ali Khan and his sons performing or a Pandit Ravi Shankar giving space to his daughter on the dais are not isolated cases of familial parampara (tradition). It has been there even otherwise, but less tried and publicised,'' said critic Shanta Sherbjeet Singh, an organiser of the festival under the aegis of the Indian Women's Press Corps.

The concerts will be preceded by the release of a collection of choice writing by Hindi women journalists, she told a press conference here.

The programme will open with a sarangi-sitar tribandi between Ustad Ghulam Sabir Khan and his twin sons Fateh Ali and Murad Ali. Vasundhara Komkali, wife of the legendary Kumar Gandharva, will next share stage with her daughter Kalapini.

On March 15, Pandit Bhatt, who will play along with his son Salil, will be accompanied on the tabla by the renowned Shafat Ahmed Khan. The series will conclude with a rendition in the Kirana gharana by the Hubli-based Hangal and her daughter Krishna.

UNI