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An opera comes alive
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An opera rediscovered by chance, `The Fakir of Benaras' is not just a simple love story but has hidden depths that thrill the viewer, writes UMA MAHADEVAN-DASGUPTA.
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OPERA was coming to a Mumbai stage after a gap of some 20 years. And the orchestra pit at the Jamshed Bhabha Theatre was being used for the first time. The scene — the holy city of Benaras. Sundra is not beautiful, but longs to love, and to be loved. Kandour is handsome, but he is blind. She becomes his guide, and their love seems perfect until, one day, a Fakir arrives, who might be able to cure Kandour's blindness. Kandour wants to see Sundra's face; she, afraid that he will reject her, tries to convince him that inner beauty is more important. In the end, being persuaded to apply the magic balm to his eyes, she covers her own face and faints, but magically, the balm has made her beautiful, too, and the lovers are united in marriage. This is the story of "The Fakir of Benaras", an opera in French, an Indo-French production directed by filmmaker and designer Muzaffar Ali, and produced by Francis Wacziarg of Neemrana Hotels. The opera was performed recently at the splendid Jamshed Bhabha Theatre in the NCPA Complex, Mumbai.
Composed as an opera by one Leo Manuel in France in 1922, "The Fakir of Benaras" tells a story of love, beauty and goodness. Its melodic score is bright and simple, closely following the story as it takes place on the banks of the Ganges. Muzaffar Ali's is a lavish, exquisitely beautiful Benaras, full of colour and life, and neither folksy nor exotic. The visuals, both the projections of wheat fields, stone buildings and the great river, as well as the stage movements, were beautifully composed.
French composer and conductor Frederic Ligier conducted the Delhi Symphony Orchestra (the largest permanent orchestra in India) performing with members of the Bombay Chamber Orchestra. Francis Wacziarg's daughter Aude Priya Wacziarg, as Sundra, was full of grace and passion; Frederic Poilvet was a spirited Kandour. The chorus, by the Paranjoti Academy Chorus, the Stop Gaps Cultural Academy and the Capital City Minstrels, was a delight.
Also pleasing was Ali's addition of two ballets, one a pleasing kathak performance by Aditi Mangaldas and her troupe, the other an energetic contemporary dance by Samudra from Kerala. Nissar Allana's sets gave a real sense of life on the banks of this greatest of rivers. Usefully, subtitles ran along on side screens, allowing the audience to follow the poetic French lyrics.
Leo Manuel, it appears, was a pseudonym: the real identity of the composer, whether it was a Baron Leontino, or even a woman, remains a mystery. The story came from a Michel Carre tale, written in the 19th Century. It appears that the Parisian publisher Enoch, a victim of the Nazis, found that the background music had been partly destroyed sometime between 1940 and 1945. It was by chance that Priya Wacziarg, who is the lead soprano in the opera, discovered the score (voice and piano) in a Parisian music shop. Yet the orchestral score and the conductor's score were still untraced.
Frederic Ligier, who has orchestrated and conducted "The Fakir of Benaras", describes the starting point of the enterprise of bringing this work back to life: it was to preserve, above all else, the bright and lovely melodic line.
As we follow the story that unfolds before us, the main roles have their own accompanying music: Kandour, the blind man, with the English horn or the oboe; Sundra, the beautiful girl, with the flute; Mebroud the Brahmin with the trombone and kettledrums; and Alibeck, the Fakir, first with the trumpet and then the bassoon. And finally, "The Fakir of Benaras" is not only the love story of a man and a woman, but of men and women with the world around them, the city, the river and the sky. The libretto is suffused with poetry and feeling: "On the sacred banks of the Ganges/a blurred sun admires itself in the waters; its gentle warmth intoxicates."
And again, when the boatmen draw near: "Here is the beloved city, entirely misted over/its sight enraptures my soul!"
And later, we see Kandour looking at the world around him and marvelling at it: "The horizon expands, the universe reveals itself/My soul, drunk with blue skies, climbs towards the sun!"
A special experience indeed, both musically and for its example of successful East-West collaboration in the classical arts.
The Fakir of Benaras, Directed by Muzaffar Ali, Jamshed Bhabha Theatre, Mumbai
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