Arun Kashalkar and a Journey to the Edge of Music
On a winter evening in 2016, the author, Sumana Ramanan, casually attends a private Hindustani music performance in South Mumbai. The singer, a man in his early seventies, specialises in khayal, one of the Indian subcontinent’s most scintillating music genres, the very name of which means ‘imagination’. Astounded by what she hears, Ramanan sets off on a mission to solve the mystery of the missing maestro: for, although a student of khayal, a regular concert-goer and someone who writes about music, she has never heard him before.
In this musical detective story, Ramanan unravels the secret of the life, art and milieu of this singer, Arun Kashalkar. He performs and passes on his edgy style on the fringes of the mainstream Hindustani music ecosystem in Mumbai, which has been the epicentre of the art form since the turn of the twentieth century. He is one of the most accomplished and charismatic figures in a wider underground scene, that is hidden in plain sight but has been preserving this music in its most vibrant colours.
On joining Kashalkar’s large student community, Ramanan grapples with his intricate and rhythm-infused style while exploring answers to fundamental questions about the nature of the mainstream and the reasons for the rise of an underground culture. The Secret Master is thus also an excavation of khayal’s multicultural history and a meditation on its aesthetics and contemporary practice.
Additional features
Links to images, poems and stories that complement the book.