An enthralling Indian music experience

The Manganiyar Seduction
Civic Theatre, The edge
Until March 12

If Ravi Shankar had ever decided to create a traditional Indian orchestra it would have looked like the ensemble which plays The Manganiyar Seduction.

The group of forty Manganiyar musicians and singers from the Thar desert region are packed into a four-tiered structure with each of them seated or standing in little bright red curtained spaces surrounded by rows of lights. They look as though they are a cabaret act or Broadway show.

The music is essentially traditional and probably normally played by just a few musicians, but the director Roysten Abel has created a new format for their work bringing Indian and Western concepts of performance together.

The performance builds from a single player with other singers and instrumentalist being added. Some of them play for most of the concert while others only have brief solo spots. There are stringed instruments, drums, mouth harps and other assorted instruments, some are played sedately while others are attacked enthusiastically.

The music builds from simple combinations of instruments through to an apocalyptic conclusion with waves of sound and frenetic playing.

The musicians are carefully and energetically marshalled and conducted by Deu Khan (most of the ensemble have the same surname) who is as much a performer as the players, providing a passionate approach to conducting as well as occasionally involving the audience with musical gamers.

The sounds are of India but there are hints of other musical idioms; the touch of Scottish bagpipes a bit Pacific drumming and some of the singers come close to Maori waiata. There also seems to be some stylistic borrowings from jazz with many of the sequences having a sense of improvisation with the soloists taking off on tangents.

We become accustomed to a Western style of melodic structure where voice and music are in close harmony. To encounter music which has a more abstract approach, where emotional content is delivered in a different way and where musical climaxes have a different intensity is refreshing and enlightening.