Mumbai: Actress Raakhee Gulzar spent weeks learning how to play the sitar from the maestro Pandit Ravi Shankar himself. It was for her role of the unfulfilled housewife in Aparna Sen's 'Paroma'.
Recalling the glorious time she had strumming those magical strings under the guidance of the late master sitarist, Raakhee said: "There were scenes in 'Paroma' where my character was shown to be playing the sitar. Neither Aparna nor I wanted to fake it. Pandit Ravi Shankar was requested to give me sitar lessons."
What was meant to be just surface-level tips on rudimentary rules of managing the instrument, turned out to be full-fledged lessons in sitar-playing.
"Initially, I was afraid the strings would cut my fingers. But once I started practising on the sitar, all my fears evaporated. Panditji first taught me how to hold the sitar properly before playing it. Then when we got down to the strings, I realised Panditji's strings on the sitar were positioned exactly in the opposite way to Ustad Vilayat Khan's sitar."...
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02:36 PM, Dec 14, 2012
