On July 18, 2024, just under nine decades after Crickett Smith and his Symphonians went into a Bombay studio to record a foxtrot called Taj Mahal, the tune was performed in the ballroom of the hotel by the Thilo Wolf band from Germany. It was quite a thrill to hear the long-dormant tune being given new life.
Here’s there original version.
And the gents who made the recording in 1936.
Portrait of Prahlad Mehta by Hal Green (Extract from the manuscript books) By Nakul P. Mehta Saxophonist Nakul Mehta, who has a storehouse of memories about the Indian jazz scene, …
Duke Ellington visited India in 1963 as part of the US State Department’s programme during the Cold War to attempt to use jazz to win hearts and minds in the …
By Roxanne Noronha Late one evening in 1974, my mum, her siblings and their mother gathered around their sitting room table, in Bandra, Bombay, readied their transistor radio and tuned …
This post is long overdue. Eight years ago, I received a note from Irena Yashin-Shaw about her father. Here’s what she said: Walter Yashin was a Russian musician who had …
On January 18, Badal Roy’s niece, Piali Roy, announced that the pioneering tabla player had passed away. Here’s a piece I wrote about him in 1998. Brandishing his spatula like …
The search is eternal and the journey is everlasting. That’s the conclusion Indo-jazz guitar player Arthur Gracias has drawn from a lifetime of playing music, first in Calcutta where he …
“Early mornings, I could hear the church bells ringing, azaan from the mosque and chants from the Hindu temples.” Those are among the earliest memories of Indo-jazz guitar player Arthur …
In December 2020, just over nine years after I first wrote about my attempt to dig out information about Mena Silas, the Bombay musician who had composed Taj Mahal: A Foxtrot in 1936, …
Another episode in our series about jazzy tunes that inspired Bollywood. From Phool Aur Patthar (1966), sung by Asha Bhonsale, here’s Zindagi Mein Pyar Karna Seekh Le. The music was …