Samaagam

Samaagam, a Sanskrit word meaning ‘confluence’ or ‘flowing together’, is the title of a new concerto which brings together India's sarod maestro Amjad Ali Khan with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra (SCO). Conductor David Murphy, who has a special interest in Indian classical music, says his aim was ‘to preserve both Indian and Western traditions of music so they can flow into one another.’

The piece is preceded by three solo ragas for sarod with tabla accompaniment, which give an idea of the power of the instrument in its traditional style, although unfortunately the ‘Khamaj’ and ‘Bhairavi’ tracks have got mixed up.

Samaagam is a three-movement concerto for sarod and orchestra in a broad fast, slow, fast form with a slow introduction. But actually it doesn't really follow a Western classical form and sounds more like Western instruments playing Indian music – which they have done in Indian film music since the 1940s. Across the three movements Amjad Ali Khan makes use of 13 ragas, which break the piece down into shorter sections. The middle, slow movement is a medley of seven ragas with solo instruments (on violin and bassoon, for instance) duetting with sarod. It reaches a high point with Amjad singing on ‘Kaushik Dhwani’ where the interaction between instruments comes into its own. There's a lyrical quality to the music throughout and the ‘Bhairavi’ conclusion to the last movement is simply out of this world. Samaagam is definitely one of the most successful works of its kind.